Caught in the Middle
by Phoenix Slave
Summary: Sasuke and Gaara join the Akatsuki and Sasuke soon finds himself in difficult situations as time goes by and bonds become clear. GaaSasu, UCHIHAcestnot what you think. Rated M for a reason.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or any of its characters.**

**Caught in the Middle**

**Chapter one: Cold Hearts**

Sasuke opened the door and looked at the room until he heard an impatiend growl behind him and remembered about Gaara waiting to get inside instead of waiting for him to stare. He entered and stepped asside, allowing the sand ninja to follow him inside the room. It was warm and everything was new and spotless. The walls were painted in a beautiful bloody red with some black kanji delicatly drawn in certain places and a huge window on the wall opposite to the door, black curtains hanging on each side, down to the floor. It was at dusk and there wasn't much light coming through the window so everything was a little obscure but it was obvious that the room was good for both of them to try to live together without killing each other.

There was one bed on the left side, on which Sasuke had already put his backpack and there was another bed on the other side of the room. There were bookshelves instead of bedside tables at the heads of the beds and next to the bookshelves guarding Gaara's bed was a door that led to a big bathroom. A desk occupied the opposite corner of the room, next to the window, on Sasuke's side of the room and it looked like they had to share it because there was only one. The other thing they had to share was the wardrobe but that seemed big enough to keep both the boys' clothes. All the pieces of furniture were dark-brown, the sheets covering the beds were black and the carpet on the floor was also a dark colour, although Sasuke couldn't determine it in the dim light.

Gaara let his gourd next to his bed and looked outside the window, through the branches of the old trees. Sasuke sat on his bed, still trying to figure out what had made him come to the Akatsuki and actually **join** the organization where he knew his brother was! He would be close to him now, but he didn't know if that would help him in his mission to kill the older Uchiha. The second thing he was trying to figure out was him being teamed up with Gaara and especially, the sand ninja one tailed-beast being there. Who would have thought Gaara to join the Akatsuki? He was the host of the Shukaku, it was impossible for the Akatsuki not to want anything to do with that and yet he had come without any second thoughts, but that was none of Sasuke's business and he didn't want to get involved.

It seemed almost a miracle that the Leader had accepted them so easily. It was a true miracle that they could 'persuade' two of the members, Kakuzu and Hidan, to tell them where the Akatsuki base was. After torturing Hidan for weeks (Sasuke had lost his temper with Kakuzu and 'accidentally' killed him) they found out everything they wanted to know. Now they would let the Akatsuki members do their jobs and get the traitor back to punish him in their own way...

"Are you hungry?" Sasuke asked, looking tired at Gaara, who was stading in front of the window with his arms crossed. The red-haired ninja shook his head after glimpsing towards him and went to his bed, lying on it to stare at the ceiling. "Yeah, me neither..." the Uchiha muttered, doing the same thing, but intending to sleep rather than stare at the red ceiling like his new partner. He didn't know much about Gaara, just that he couldn't sleep because of the shukaku and he thought he didn't want to know more. Besides, the red head was just not going to tell him anything. He was there only to have the chance to kill as much as he wanted, not for a stupid partnership or anything else.

He closed his eyes, enjoying the dark and the silence. Still, with all his tiredness, he wanted to know where his brother was. Itachi must have recognised his chakra pattern by then and was probably trying to find out what was his little foolish brother doing there with the host of the one tailed beast. He first felt Gaara's unusual chakra as he concentrated on locating Itachi, but he was used to such weird pattern because of Naruto, then scanned the other rooms in search of his brother. Sasuke nearly jumped out of the bed. He could feel it in the room next to them, a calm, cold flow, impossible to mistake for another. So Itachi was right next door! How funny could destiny be...

So, he was calm? Sasuke could almost feel hate burning inside him when he thought about his brother. How could Itachi not feel the same knowing that he was there, right under his nose?? That bastard. He told his thoughts to shut up and decided that a bath would be good for his sore body to relax and stood up, heading towards the bathroom door. For some reason (instinct perhaps) he wanted to dodge an imaginary blow of Gaara's sand but he somehow felt disappointed when he realised that the red-haired ninja had no intent to attack him with his chakra infused sand and entered the bathroom, closing the door behind him.

Everything was made of white marble with red veins drawing complicated nets on the floor and walls. Sasuke looked in the huge mirror above the sink and saw his hair was tousled more than ever and that his headband was starting to fall to one side, the horror of him almost looking like Kakashi making the boy turn around to let the hot spring water to fill the tub. He then took his headband off by simply pulling it and looked at the symbol of Konoha. He took his kunai and placed its sharp point on the metal, slowly moving his hand to leave a scratch mark over the leaf symbol. Now he really felt like a missing-nin.

He almost threw his other clothes off him to get into the tub as fast as he could and happily sunk in the hot water, feeling his strained muscles finally relaxing. A smile bloomed on his lips and he let out a groan of pleasure, feeling the smooth surface of the tub against his back and the water like a hot liquid blaket wrapped lightly around him. So, the Akatsuki members were treated like real aristocrats despite being such low criminals... at least he could cope with that aspect. He still didn't know if he'd be able to kill with such cold blood, but he was sure Gaara would be more than happy to do that for him until he got used to being a member of that organization.

He couldn't wait to be face to face with that bastard that was his brother. Even after two years of training with the other bastard, the snake Orochimaru, his abilities were not enough to surpass Itachi's. Sasuke just couldn't wait to see his reaction to his little brother being there, so close, as a member of the same organization. He'd enjoy to see Itachi full of rage or even ready to kill him for being such an idiot, because Sasuke knew that joining the Akatsuki was the last thing he should have done, mostly because it was only to annoy his older brother.

Sasuke let his body glide smoothly deeper into the tub, looking at the bubbles he made by exhaling with his nose under water. He accidentally inhaled and jumped out in an instant, sneezing and coughing angrily. He wrapped a towel around his waist and took another one to dry his hair, walking out of the bathroom still coughing to get rid of the water viciously burning his windpipe.

His heart jolted strangely again when he saw Gaara sitting on the window sill. His left leg was propped up and his arm was resting on top of his knee, while his other leg was hanging motionless along the wall, not reaching the floor, his right arm bent in his lap. Sasuke went to his bed and sat on it, drying his hair with the towel while silently gazing at the sand ninja. A silver moonbeam fell on his face, making it even more pale, but not pale like a dead, just beautifully pale. Probably the slight glitter of his sand shield was making his skin look like that.

Sasuke slipped into his boxers and shorts, making sure that Gaara wasn't looking and just as he was going to put his black sleeping t-shirt on, the sand ninja jumped of the window sill silently and went into the bathroom. The Uchiha finished dressing and heard the tub filling with water. So, he was not the only one who appreciated a bath after such a long journey. Wait a minute. He turned around and looked next to Gaara's bed. He had left his gourd behind! Sasuke was finally free to look at it closely! He couldn't miss such an opportunity!

He waited to hear the water stop pouring in the tub, then Gaara's clothes rustled in the silence and finally, no more sounds. Sasuke had to move carefully and he was able to do that easily because leaf ninjas were trained to use stealth almost perfectly, due to the fact that Konoha was surrounded by thick forests and any crack of wood under a ninja's foot could have turned a mission into a disaster. Finally, he reached the bed and knelt in front of the gourd, holding his hands out to touch it. His eyes became crimson red and he could now see the tiny particles of sand the gourd was made from, thanks to his sharingan.

His fingers spread as he almost touched the strange gourd Gaara took with him everywhere but just as he thought he could feel the hard sand under his fingers, his body was gripped by sand from inside the gourd, lifted into the air, unable to move any part of his body but his head. He struggled but with no other effect than his physical exhaustion. He had underestimated Gaara. How could he have been so foolish to believe the sand ninja would leave his gourd unprotected?? There was nothing he could do except wait.

Almost half an hour later, the bathroom door opened and Sasuke turned his head to meet the eyes of a very calm Gaara, who walked to his bed without looking at him, as if he weren't even there, trapped in his sand. The red-haired ninja had a towel around his waist and his chest was exposed to Sasuke's curious look. He was thin, but with well developed muscles visible under pale skin and no exposed ribs to count, as the leaf ninja had thought.

Sand covered Sasuke's eyes as he heard clothes rustling and after less than a minute, the sand making everything darker than it actually was returned to the rest of the harsh mass keeping his body unmoved and he could see Gaara finally looking at him.

"Are you going to keep me like this for the rest of the night?" Sasuke asked, trying to sound less sleepy than he was. It was such an embarrassing situation.

"No. I might kill you for this." the reply was, cool, calm and colected.

"I was just curious."

"Curiosity is going to get you killed one day. This gourd is like my own body."

Sasuke felt a cold shiver running down his spine at the sound of his voice. There was something about it that made him feel weird. More like... frightened. He hated that word but it was close to what he felt and he couldn't deny it. Something in that icy tone told him that Gaara wouldn't hesitate in doing what he had said. 'I might kill you for this'. By saying that the gourd was like his body, the sand ninja probably suggested that he could feel whatever approached it just like he could feel anything near his body.

"I wasn't going to do anything." the Uchiha defended himself.

"Respect other people's property and I shall let you live."

"I'm not afraid of you!" Sasuke snapped.

Gaara sat on his bed and the grip slightly tightened around the raven-haired ninja. He knew he could be crushed like a bug but that didn't matter as long as he was in such an embarrassing situation. He tried to move and discovered that his body was now starting to hurt.

"I don't care if you are afraid of me or not. Mind your own business."

The sand around Sasuke released him and went back inside the gourd as the ninja tried to stand without trembling because of numbness. He didn't want Gaara to think he was weak so he looked at him, ready for a short fight before going to bed but to his great surprise, the sand ninja lay in bed already, obviously not interested in any kind of arguments.

Sasuke grawled at him and went out of the room, turning back to the door and staring at it like an idiot when he realised he didn't know why he had left it! It certainly had something to do with his vainglory. Now he could only enter the room at least an hour later, otherwise Gaara would know he had been overwhelmed by shame and fear.

He grawled again, wondering what could he do in a whole hour. He needed sleep, that was for sure, but he couldn't sleep until he got back into the room. He turned away, trying not to think about his warm bed and fluffy pillow and grawled again. Sasuke stopped suddenly at the sight of one of the Akatsuki members, swallowing a thick lump in his throat to speak in a hoarse voice that didn't even seem to be his.

"Itachi!"

He met his brother's sharingan just for a second before the man entered his room and closed the door. Without thinking twice, Sasuke rushed after him, slamming the door and locking it without any purpose.

"Don't you dare ignore me!" he hissed. "Look at me!" the boy demanded, angry that his brother wouldn't even bother to look at him.

"To see what?" Itachi's reply was as he slowly turned his head to gaze upon Sasuke with one crimson eye.

"I came here to prove that I can be just as good as you! At least try to look as if you realise what I've done!"

"You've done nothing great."

Despite that barrier of void that hid Itachi's true feelings and thoughts, Sasuke could see a slight trace of disappointment in his eyes. Nothing great?

"So... you've got nothing else to say to me? Something like 'oh, Sasuke you're so stupid and such a nuisance why did you bother come here you little brat'?"

"Why waste my time with you?" he replied in a cold voice, making Sasuke take a deep breath and step backwards. Itachi took his cloak off and put it on the couch, then turned to his little brother and glared silently at him. "You don't want to be here anymore." The man almost let the light of a smile brighten his eyes. "But there is no turning back now. You shouldn't have come here in the first place."

"Why not?" Sasuke glared with the same anger.

"I am the first reason for which you should have never left Konoha."

"And the second reason?"

"You."

Sasuke raised an eyebrow in confusion.

"Me?"

Itachi narrowed his eyes. His little brother was still so naive and childish. Still just a kid despite that mature body that emprisoned his soul. Such a pity.

"Never mind. Guess you'll always be too ignorant to notice me anyway." Sasuke suddenly snapped, leaving the room just as fast as he had come in. He didn't give a damn on his pride right now so he angrily slammed the door to his room, completely forgeting about Gaara, jumped in his bed and pulled the soft blanket over him, biting his lip in frustration. Itachi was right, there was no turning back now.

So, he was now a member of the Akatsuki, the criminal organization where his brother was and he was teamed with a cold blooded sand ninja who would have killed him without a second thought. How worst could it get?


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter two: High Speed**

"Wake up, Sleeping Beauty."

Sasuke opened his eyes and growled at the sight of his red-haired partner standing next to his bed with his arms crossed. Some of his bones still hurt from the other night, when Gaara's sand prevented him from moving for almost an hour.

"What?" he asked, in an annoyed tone.

"Pein."

The raven-haired boy stood up and went to the bathroom, locking the door, finally allowing himself to yawn. The Leader wanted to talk to them so early in the morning? It was just their second day there, was he going to send them on a mission? There were many questions in his head but he could find answer to none of them. After pouring some water on his face he tried to make his hair look 'normal' but it seemed that those black strands just wouldn't agree with him.

"Fuck." he cursed, walking out and almost bumping into Gaara but stopped just in time. "What's the time?"

"Half past seven."

Sasuke looked outside, at the orange and bloody lights.

"Well it's damn early! Why can't he let me sleep until nine??"

"Half past seven p.m." Gaara continued in a low voice.

"Oh..."

The dark-haired ninja felt so stupid mistaking a setting sun for a rising one. Gaara didn't seem to notice but he probably didn't care much anyway. Sasuke dressed up and tried to convince his hair not to spread in all directions as he adjusted his headband, but he failed to do so and realised that it was one of those bad-hair days. A loud sigh escaped his throat and Gaara turned around, gazed at him for a very long second, then walked towards him and held his hand out.

The first thing Sasuke thought he should do was go backwards but his feet refused to obey and then he felt Gaara's hand running through his hair, not too fast but not too slow, and he knew it was too late to do anything. What was he doing?? The sand ninja removed his hand from Sasuke's hair and walked towards the door.

"Happy now?" he asked in a cold, mocking voice.

Sasuke followed him in complete silence. He didn't like how Gaara treated him, he didn't like the tone in which he spoke to him, but he did like the feeling of his hand in his hair. Almost unconsciously, he ran his fingers through the black strands that were now in their natural disorder and felt sand under his touch. So that was what Gaara had done to make his hair look normal!

They had to walk through some kind of library where Deidara and Sasori were probably doing some study for their next mission, then climbed some stairs and reached an upper level of the headquarters, where the Leader's office and private quarters were. Gaara stopped in front of a door and Sasuke thought that he looked like he had been a member of the Akatsuki for his entire life. He already knew every part of the headquarters and every other member, he probably even hated some of them already, like his cousin Sasori... Sasuke didn't even know where the kitchen was.

He heard a voice coming from behind the door but couldn't identify the words. Apparently, Gaara could, because he pushed the door open and Sasuke followed him inside. It was a rather dark room, full of books and scrolls spread all over the place, mostly on bookshelves and on the big round table in front of the man sitting on a chair. There were candlesticks with white candles burning on the table, those being the only source of light. It was the second time Sasuke saw the Leader and his first impression was unchanged: he looked young.

"Welcome." he said, closing a huge book. "I hope you had time to regain your strength after such a long journey. I know this may seem a bit too early, but I'm sending you two on a mission. It won't be too hard. Just an assassination. Take it as a... trial run."

"Any time limit?" Sasuke asked.

"Three days. Your target is a man named Takuma, from the Land of Mist. He is a simple mercenary, not a ninja and the reasons for which you must kill him are none of your business. This is something only the employer and myself must know. He always wears a red scarf around his neck and has a black rose tatoo on his left wrist. Do you think you can do it?"

Gaara sniffed.

"Too easy." he said.

"I promise your next mission will not be as easy as this one. As I told you, take it as a trial run."

"Fine." Gaara muttered.

"And you, young Uchiha?"

"It's okay."

"Well then, you leave tonight and you must be back in three days. Otherwise, you will no longer be members of the Akatsuki and I will send Zetsu after you. You are dismissed."

"Who the hell is Zetsu?" Sasuke asked after the two left the Leader's office.

"The Akatsuki's hunter-nin."

"The Land of Mist is far from here. I don't think we can make it in three days. It'll take us two to get there and we also have to find this Takuma... what if Pein is trying to get rid of us?"

"Shut up."

"We can't get there, kill the target and get back in three days!"

"**You** can't."

Sasuke stared at him in disbelief but Gaara didn't continue so he had to figure that out on his own. Was the red head suggesting that **he** could do that job in three days?

"You can stay here if you want to." Gaara told him in the same mocking voice.

"I won't let you have all the fun!" he sneered in reply.

Gaara's black ringed eyes narrowed a little, but then his facial expression became as empty as usual and Sasuke entered their room to start packing some food, water and other things, while his partner packed two blankets. Less than half an hour later they left the headquarters and started to make their way through the branches at top speed.

Sasuke wondered why Gaara had taken those blankets, because they both knew there was no time for sleep and they'd probably eat while jumping from branch to branch, but he stopped himself from asking stupid questions that would only annoy the sand ninja to the point of using his sand against him again. He didn't want that to happen.

After a few hours it started to get increasingly cold and the freezing air cutting slices through his bones, combined with physical tiredness began to slow him down. The worst part of it was seeing Gaara unaffected. It was like everything around him was trying to prove that he was weak and useless as a ninja, although he tried very hard to prove to himself that he was good enough. The thought of his brother seeing him like that made him regain some strength and catch up with his partner although he didn't know for how long he could move at that amazing speed the host of the one tailed beast was taking for 'normal'.

The pain in his feet soon become impossible to deny any longer and he wanted to ask Gaara to stop, at least for five minutes, but he bit his lip and decided to continue, no matter what. He was not weak and he would not prove the contrary to Gaara by stopping. Kirigakure was half a day away. They could get there by the crack of dawn if they kept moving.

Sasuke would have felt better to hear Gaara breathing as heavily as he was but it was like nothing could make him tired or affected. It couldn't be just because of the tailed beast. The red-haired ninja probably had a natural resistance and that, combined with the resistance the shukaku gave him, could make him strong enough to move that fast and not even have to catch his breath.

Later that night, Sasuke could barely breath and his lungs seemed to be on fire as the cold air ran through his body like sharp blades everytime he inhaled. He lagged behind and his vision became unclear, he staggered and barely managed to prevent himself from falling by stopping and falling to his knees, breathing the frosty air deeply. Suprisingly, Gaara had also stopped, jumping back to the branch Sasuke was knelt on.

"You idiot." he muttered. "Don't breath like that, you'll get yourself with a pneumonia."

Sasuke couldn't listen to him even if he'd wanted to. He seemed not to have enough air even with the deep breaths he took too fast. Gaara pulled him up forcefully and made him look through the trees by holding his hand out.

"That's where we have to get." he hissed, showing him lights flickering through the leaves and thick mist. "Do you think you can do it or not?"

The raven-haired ninja freed himself from his grip and tried not to stagger on his feet as his breathing slowly became even again.

"I... can!" he gasped out. Gaara nodded slightly and looked in his eyes for one, painful second, then continued at the same fast pace and Sasuke followed him close behind. It was unbelievable! Kiri was just miles away from them! It was enough to make him keep going.

A few minutes later they sneaked in the village over the walls and stopped on a roof. The mist was making everything around them impossible to see. He could barely see Gaara, even if he was just a few steps from him. The sand ninja used his Third Eye, which appeared floating in his palm, to locate the target.

It didn't take much for Gaara to break the jutsu, which meant that he had found the man they were looking for. Sasuke wondered how did that Third Eye work but he decided to keep his questions for later, when Gaara wouldn't be so pissed off. He saw the sand ninja getting ready to go after Takuma and stood up but Gaara glared at him:

"Stay here. You have caused me enough trouble already."

"I'm not going to stay here!"

"I don't need you 'help' getting in the way."

"This is not **your** mission, it's **our** mission! Like it or not, we have to work together so you'd better work on your attitude because I'm not going to accept this shit!"

Gaara turned to face him and Sasuke felt a cold shiver down his spine when he saw the look in his eyes. He knew what was next: sand gripping him with the strength of the red head's anger. He waited but nothing came out of the gourd.

"I don't give a damn on your opinion but if you do stay in my way, I will kill you." the sand ninja hissed before jumping off the roof on a dark, narrow street. A water canal was on the left side, parallel to the street. Sasuke looked around, trying to see something, anything, through the thick fog, but it was no use, so he activated his sharingan.

Gaara pushed him into a wall, in the dark, with one hand and the raven-haired ninja gasped when his back hit the cold, wet wall, but then took his kunai from its place and got ready. He could now see the silhouette slowly walking down the street, staggering on his feet as if drunk.

"That fuckin' piece of... he lied!" Sasuke whispered. "I can feel his chakra! He's a ninja!"

"And what's the problem?" the sand ninja asked, removing the cork from his gourd.

Sand fell on the ground in a small heap.

"I can hear you..." a voice came out from the mist. "Nothing can hide from mist ninjas, but we can hide from you."

In the next second there was a short scream of surprise and Sasuke could see the man caught in Gaara's Sand Coffin, struggling to breath. Before Takuma could even think about performing a jutsu, the sand had swallowed him completely and Gaara closed his hand into a tight fist, the only thing remaining from the ninja being his blood which stained the sand.

Sasuke felt dizzy but the strange feeling disappeared soon and after corking up the gourd, Gaara went back to him. Now they had to go back. He jumped after the red head on the roofs until they managed to get out of Kiri without being seen by any guards and they were safely back into the forest.

"Don't you ever get tired?" Sasuke asked, noticing that Gaara's pace was still too fast. The sand ninja responded with a growl and continued to go at the same high speed, skillfully avoiding the branches that could have hit him. His partner couldn't help but follow him, despite not liking the situation.

The same strange dizziness made him stagger and take a wrong step on a broken branch, a short splitting headache going through his head like a thousand daggers and making him close his eyes tightly as he fell. Something stopped him from falling and he then felt something soft under him, as his back recognised the rough bark of a tree trunk.

Sasuke opened his eyes and saw Gaara lightly taking him on his back.

"Listen, I..."

"Shut up and hold on." he growled, jumping back into the trees and starting to leap from branch to branch. His speed seemed unaffected by the surplus of weight. The Uchiha couldn't get rid of the dizziness and the headache was back, just as powerful as the first time, so he closed his eyes and tried to ignore everything, except for Gaara's hands holding his legs around his waist and the feeling of the warm flesh of his shoulder under his right cheek. It was harsh because of the sand shield covering his skin, but it felt... caressingly harsh.

He knew what he felt was wrong and it was probably the illness that was messing up with his brain, but he had never felt anything like it in his entire life. For a moment he thought he could hear Gaara's heart beating and after listening carefully he could hear it clearly. He didn't know for how long he listened to it or how much longer would it take for Gaara to reach the headquarters but as the sun rose and set just as fast, meaning that a day had passed, he started to become worried. They had enough time to get to the headquarters in time, but Gaara's heart beating was becoming fast and his breathing accelerated as well.

Unaware of it, his hands strengthened their grip around Gaara and the latter's voice barely made itself heard through the gasps for air.

"Not so hard!"

"You have to stop!" Sasuke told him, his voice hoarst and dry. "We both need a break."

Suprisingly, Gaara slowed down and finally, stopped, looking around for a place for them to rest. A few minutes later they went down and made a fire, eating some of the food Sasuke had packed before leaving the headquarters. Gaara rested his body against a tree and Sasuke lay on the soft carpet of dead leaves, covering himself with one of the blankets they had brought with them. He winced in pain as his lungs were on fire again and the illness was slowly devouring his body.

"Don't say I didn't warn you." the red-haired ninja told him.

Sasuke growled and turned his face to the fire, happy to be able to look at his partner through the flames. Damn, that cold hearted demon looked so good! He could barely stop himself from going to him and that was only because he knew that no matter what his feeling were for the sand ninja, Gaara would never feel the same for him, he'd never trust him, not to mention love him. Actually, he wasn't sure he loved Gaara, it was more like he needed him, more than a simple friend, or even best friend, but not as much as a lover. He didn't know. It was not the illness anymore, he was sure about his feelings now.

"What are you staring at?"

The sound of Gaara's tired voice made him remember what happened to those who looked at him in a certain way. A way the host of the shukaku resended to the point of killing those who dared to stare in that specific way mercilessly.

"I was wondering how far is the Akatsuki." Sasuke lied.

"Not far. Just a few more miles."

"Then let's go. I can walk on my feet."

"Yeah right." Gaara's mocking reply came. "You can't even get up from that place without me helping you."

Sasuke chuckled, to his surprise.

"Guess you were right about me being an idiot but I don't want to be here. I don't care if I have to crawl back to the Akatsuki, I'll get back there tonight!"

Gaara stood up and glared at him.

"Don't you think you're being a nuisance?"

Sasuke tried to stand but his feet failed to help him so he stumbled and fell, making Gaara let out a chuckle. How pathetically cute.

"Fine." he said, pouring water over the fire.

He packed everything and took Sasuke on his back again, then continued to go towards the Akatsuki headquarters. So much for the 'break'.


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto & Co.**

**Sorry for making you wait. For two weeks at school I had one or two tests per day. I know it's not a good excuse but it's the truth...**

**Chapter three: Tight Bind**

Sasuke fidgeted in his bed a little and opened his eyes. Even the rustle of the sheets seemed loud and unpleasant to his ears. He couldn't keep his eyes opened for too long and closed them again, turning with his face up, to the ceiling. Gaara had given him some weird 'potion' to drink and he was now almost sure it had been poison, not something to make him feel better, because he didn't feel any better. He felt worse than before.

He felt cold and thirsty and he wanted to get some sleep but he couldn't because of the pain rummaging inside his body. Sasuke heard the door and almost jumped out of bed if it weren't for Gaara to hiss threateningly at him.

"Stay there!"

"What did he say?" the raven-haired boy asked, kicking the sheets away because they kept sticking to his body and almost strangling him.

"Nothing special. Why aren't you sleeping?"

"Because of that stupid poison you gave me!"

"I said you'd be better tomorrow morning, not tonight."

"You didn't say I'd feel worst until tomorrow morning!"

"You seem to have enough energy to argue about this."

"At least give me some water."

"I told you I won't. The potion will dilute and its effects will disappear if you drink anything. Shut up and go to sleep." he replied quickly.

"I can't!"

"You act like a spoiled three-year old."

Sasuke growled. Every little piece of flesh around his aching bones hurt. Well, at least Gaara didn't say 'I told you so' because that would have pissed Sasuke off more than anything else. The redhead probably knew it was no use to say that since Sasuke knew it all too well already.

The raven-haired ninja closed his eyes and felt his body becoming numb enough for him to become able to fall asleep. As he was struggling between the real world and the world of dreams, something harsh touched his forehead and he recognised the sensation, immediately connecting surprise to his sharingan to activate it and his hand reacted almost by itself, going like a snake after Gaara's, which had just left the skin of Sasuke's forehead.

Sasuke's heart twisted in his chest as he felt the sand covering Gaara's wrist reacting slightly violent to his unexpected move. Gaara stopped, staring at him with aquamarine eyes. He didn't try to free his wrist from the boy's grip nor did he try to make a move, only winking from time to time, as seconds passed and neither of them seemed to want to break the strange physical contact.

The Uchiha bit his tongue and lowered his eyes as he finally released his partner's wrist. His chest went up and down at a fast pace and despite the fact that the redhead's eyes were still fixed upon Sasuke's, he could see that too.

"Something wrong?" Gaara asked, deciding that he had been silent for too long.

"Uhm... water." Sasuke, replied in a dry voice.

"No."

"I won't beg for it!" the dark-haired boy snapped but he immediately knew it was a mistake he shouldn't repeat in the foreseeable future. But instead of the reaction he was used to get from Gaara everytime he crossed that specific line, the other boy simply chuckled mockingly.

"Too bad. You beg so nicely."

Sasuke's chin nearly fell from its place but he managed to control his temper. Actually, asking for water had been half a lie. He wanted water, but that was not the reason for which he had clutched at his partner like that. He wanted to feel that rough sand protected skin brushing against his for more than just a few seconds and his ninja reflexes had almost made that wish come true.

He had to admit that he was acting weird. Was he really falling for Gaara? How could he possibly fall in love with a boy? More than that, how could he fall in love with this particular boy?!? Gaara didn't seem to be able to actually fall in love, not to mention fall in love with a boy. Sasuke thought he was too cold and with a silent, deadly personality. He looked inapproachable and uncaring. Capable of loving only himself.

Sasuke forced himself to get out of the bed and staggered towards the bathroom door, but a single, strong hand gripped his forearm and pulled him forward, two piercing eyes glaring at him. Gaara growled and pushed him back to the bed, releasing his arm only when he was on the mattress again.

"Don't push your luck with me."

The leaf ninja smirked, to the redhead's slight surprise. There was no rational explanation for such a reaction, probably the fever messing up with his mind. Still, he had no excuse. Gaara's eyes glowed and narrowed in the dark, piercing Sasuke's mercilessly. The corner of his mouth went up a little and he stepped back, frowning.

Seeing him step back like that, Sasuke wanted to find a way to bring him back close to him without looking like the world's biggest idiot and was disappointed to see that his mind didn't come up with any solution...

He let himself fall on the mattress with a loud sigh and closed his eyes, hoping that he'd be able to fall asleep sooner or later, despite the fire burning inside him. His eyelashes entwined and before he could even feel tiredness sneak into his eyes he fell asleep.

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Sasuke growled low, moving his head to one side. He wiped some black strands of hair stuck to his forehead because of the sweat with the back of his hand and licked his lips in an attempt to wet them. His tongue was no longer able to keep up with his thirst. He held his hand out to reach the clock and see what time it was when a voice came to his ears:

"It's two o'clock in the morning."

Instead of feeling that horrible pain in the back of his head at any sound, his partner's voice made his headache disappear for a few seconds. Sasuke opened his onyx eyes and looked at him with his lips slightly parted, breathing heavily while the feeling of needing water more than air rummaged inside him. Gaara slowly sat on the bed, next to him, the sudden move making the leaf ninja's heart twist inside his chest again.

"Water..." Sasuke's dry voice came out of his throat. "And I won't say 'please'."

"You already have." Gaara replied, drinking some water from a glass.

Sasuke held his hand out for the glass, but the red-haired ninja smirked and put the glass on the floor, placed his palm on the hand and slowly drove it down, pinning it to the mattress while he bent towards his partner with patient and calculated moves.

Sasuke simply froze when he saw Gaara closer and closer, seconds turning to years as he waited to see what he was up to. His mind could only think about one thing and he denied it frantically because he knew the cold hearted demon of sand would have only done it to make fun of him.

Their bodies were still connected through their hands, as Gaara gently held Sasuke's wrist in place with his palm, sand brushing against bare, soft skin. A light touch of the sand ninja's chest over his sent shivers of anticipation through his entire body in endless ripples, going one after another at an amazing pace.

He closed his eyes, trying to empty his mind, not knowing why he was so panic-stricken when his body had craved for those touches for some while. Now he had what he wanted right under his nose and he was too afraid to take it. It was not about him being a ninja anymore, not about being a Uchiha, it was about being a human being, capable of feeling love for something no matter how hard it was to deal with such emotions.

Water touched his still departed lips and it felt as a blessing, barely stopping himself from moving his head forward to get more. He didn't even realise when he moved his tongue over those soft lips that were lightly touching his. He wanted to collect every single drop of water resting on them. He opened his eyes as if waking from a long, beautiful dream and he pushed himself into the mattress at the sight of those two green eyes coldly watching him.

The drops of water he had managed to collect had dried on their way down through his throat. His cheeks blushed, but happily, they were already red from the fever and Gaara couldn't notice anything. He was now standing, staring at him. Sasuke would have felt better to see something, anything, in those empty eyes. Before he could find the courage to voice some of his thoughts, the red-haired ninja turned his back and walked towards the window with slow paces.

Sasuke jumped out of bed and reached him, clunching to his cloak with an angry grip.

"What?" Gaara asked, obviously pissed off, judging by the vibrations of the low growl deep in his throat. Still, his tone was a patient one.

"You kissed me only because you knew I wanted it to happen?"

Sasuke had been forced to pick his words carefully and they still didn't seem good enough.

"What makes you think that?" the cold, dark reply came in a matter of seconds as he stepped forward, making the dark-haired boy go backwards until his back hit the wall. Sasuke decided that he wanted to be in his bed rather than in the suddenly very cold room and made a move to suggest that he wanted to go away from Gaara. The demon propped his palms against the wall, on both sides of the boy's body, letting him know that he didn't agree with that decision, instead of letting him go. "I asked you something." he insisted, in a low voice.

"Either you are sadistic and just wanted to make fun of me or curious enough to want to see my reaction."

"Why not in love?"

Sasuke bit his lip, winked and rose his eyes to meet Gaara's in a battle for dominance.

"Because you are emotionless."

If Gaara hadn't been so close the dark-haired boy wouldn't have heard the low chuckle.

"Emotionless? What a nice word." he mocked, a slight, almost seductive smirk appearing on his face. "But you don't know me, Sasuke."

Sasuke blushed and hoped that Gaara couldn't see in the dark. If he remembered well, this was the first time the sand ninja bothered to pronounce his name.

"How can you know I don't have feelings?"

The only thing Sasuke could think about were those lips moving to let out his name and Gaara seemed to notice his concentrated stare, chuckling again.

"You're not paying attention. Sasuke." he teased.

"Stop it." the boy let out a small protest. "I don't know if you do have feelings or not but I know you had once, maybe when you were a small child."

"Hmmm... maybe. Or maybe not." he whispered, bending to him, brushing his lips against the soft skin of the Uchiha's cheek, feeling him shudder under those touches. "Maybe my feelings are right where they're supposed to be but I don't feel like sharing them with every idiot that gets in my way."

"I thought I was an idiot to you."

"I didn't say you weren't."

"Then why would you share those feelings with me?"

"I don't want to know the answer. I don't care."

His voice was becoming softer with every word and Sasuke realised that he had forgotten about his thirst and pain. There was just a slight discomfort within him. He felt Gaara's slender fingers removing some dark strands resting on his cheek and moved his head after his hand, wanting to feel those touches again. He got another kiss instead and he was suprised by it, his small gasp making it possible for Gaara's tongue to sneak through his parted lips. At first Sasuke was a little scared but his instincts made it all easier and his tongue was now fighting the other's for dominance.

"Am I dreaming?" Sasuke whispered under his partner's lips. "If I am, don't you dare wake me up."

"I won't." the red-haired ninja replied, placing kisses along his neck and using his arms to pull his body closer. "But you should be in bed, sleeping instead of making me horny."

"So?"

"Get better and we'll talk after that." Gaara ended their little moment, slowly pushing his body in the opposite direction, towards the bed.

Sasuke knew thay would soon stop and tried to remember how unique he felt when Gaara made him his little toy. He didn't feel used, he felt loved and that was everything he needed to know. He let the ninja carefully lie him on bed, cover him with the blanket and when he glimpsed at him one more time and turned around, Sasuke stopped him.

"Wait." he said "Tell me this was not a dream."

"It wasn't. Now go to sleep." Gaara replied in a low voice, walking away silently to sit on the window-sill again, staring at the stars shining on the clear night sky. Before he knew it, Sasuke fell asleep.


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto & Co. Just the new character...**

**I know the events were a little rushed and the chapter a bit short and I must apologize to you. I promise I'll try harder for the next chapter... any suggestions would be welcome. Thanks for reading this.**

**Chapter four: Theatrical Play**

"Another one already?!" Sasuke snapped, staring at Gaara in disbelief. "I've just gotten better and he's sending us in another mission? This sucks! What do we have to do this time?"

"Kidnap somebody from Otogakure."

"Otogakure? Wow, this is worst than I thought. Don't tell me we have to bring Orochimaru here! I thought it was Zetsu's job to take care of traitors!"

"Shut up, it's not about Orochimaru. It's a jonin. Kay." he told the dark-haired boy, handing him the photograph of a short, dark-red-haired ninja (somehow that reminded Sasuke of Gaara because he used to be short when he was younger).

"What's with the hitae-ate? It's tied around his eyes." Sasuke noticed. "Does that mean that our target is blind?"

"That doesn't really matter. Sound ninjas don't need their eyes most of the time. Being blind wouldn't be a problem for them." Gaara replied, finally done packing.

"He seems a bit too short for a jonin. I wonder how old he is... Is there any time limit for this mission?"

"No. We have to bring Kay here unharmed."

"Don't forget that." Sasuke sneered and Gaara glared at him, throwing him one of the two backpacks.

"And you should try to stay in one piece. I've had enough trouble already with you."

Sasuke remembered that night and couldn't stop himself from giving Gaara a small peck on the lips, happy that he hadn't blushed. It felt natural. The sand ninja slightly frowned but then responded to him with a kiss, sadly short, because they had to leave, although they both knew there would be time for that to be continued later.

It was sunny outside, but despite that the air was chilly. After all, it was late October. Sasuke pulled his cloak tighter around himself, although he felt warm. Otogakure was not far from there, they could get there by dusk.

"What else do you know about this ninja? Pein must have given you some information!" Sasuke looked at his partner as they were making their way through the branches.

"What makes you think that?"

"Just tell me! You have no right to keep that to yourself! If the Akatsuki wants this jonin alive and unharmed... I thought the only things Akatsuki members are hired for are espionage and assassinations. Does this mean Pein wants this jonin for the organization? I heard some of the members were also forced to join the Akatsuki... like Deidara, who was forced by my brother."

"I don't care what they want Kay for. Let's just get this done. The rest is none of our business."

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Sasuke activated his sharingan and glimpsed around to locate the target. He could feel a chakra pattern and he was sure it was Kay's. Gaara waited silently next to his partner, sand running over his skin with delicate touches because he was actually quite impatient about this. He wanted a fight, he felt desperate for killing somebody and he wasn't allowed to.

"Fuck." he muttered in a low voice. "Hurry up or I'll go after the ninja myself."

"Be patient. It's not easy to find..."

"Looking for someone?" a strange slender woman smiled at them. There was no hitae-ate visible and no chakra flow around her body. "You two are wasting your time." she continued in the same amused tone, making Gaara visibly annoyed.

Sasuke only had time to let out a small shout before the red-haired ninja jumped from the branch and his sand rushed at the woman, the impact hidden by a cloud of sand, dust and drops of water. His sharingan allowed him to discern silhouettes, but there were three instead of two.

Gaara was immobilized. His fist was inches away from the woman's face but the rest of his body was held in place by no other than Kay. His sound hitae-ate was over his eyes, like in the photograph, covered by strands of long, dark-red hair. Sand was on the ground, around the three, useless now that it was wet. One kunai was threatening to cut Gaara's neck, its blade lightly touching the skin on which sand moved chaotically because of the danger. The other kunai, held by Kay's left hand, had stopped in the sand ninja's hidden hitae-ate, tied around his waist, under his clothes. Any move and the sound jonin would have used those kunais.

Sasuke threw his kunai towards Kay, forgeting about 'unharmed', but luckily (or not) the woman behind the boy caught it easily. Gaara tried to use this diversion to push Kay away with his feet and he managed to do it, although the kunai had let a long scratch behind, on his neck. How the hell did that kunai cut through his sand armour?! He jumped backwards and Sasuke attacked the two enemies, as Gaara's eyes widened in surprise. The kunai's blade had been wet. He could see wet sand and blood on his fingers as he touched the scratch. A sound ninja using water instead of sound? How... unusual.

The woman was now leaning against a tree, watching the fight with a smile on her lips. Finally, a sharp sound made Gaara cover his ears and he saw Sasuke being thrown against a tree trunk by the jutsu. Gaara opened his eyes and glimpsed towards his partner, letting him know what to do. Something wasn't quite right. Sasuke attacked Kay again and Gaara had a chance to put his plan into practice. Luckily some sand was still in his gourd and he used it to attack the woman, but she noticed and dodged the blow.

Sasuke heard a scream of pain and turned his head towards Gaara, whose sand was tightly wrapped around the woman's body. Kay turned to Gaara but stopped on the ground, then disappeared with a puff. A smirk appeared on the sand ninja's lips as the grip became softer.

"What the-" Sasuke asked, but then he stopped himself, realising.

The woman became smaller and her hair turned dark-red, the hitae-ate now tied over her eyes. The real Kay smiled to them from the sand's grip,

"Why couldn't I see through that jutsu? What the hell was it?" Sasuke asked, wondering if something was wrong with his sharingan.

"Kekkai genkai silly, what else? Your sharingan can't see through that, can it?" Kay chuckled lightly. "You're lucky your partner figured it out for you."

His voice was cold, mocking.

"I'm sorry I couldn't fight with you properly. I'm a little tired after some missions..." the weird ninja excused.

"Let's go." Gaara said. "And you'd better keep your mind off any 'ideas'." he hissed towards Kay.

"I will. I'm going to sleep. Thanks for carrying me."

Sasuke raised an eyebrow. Were they going to have to deal with such ninja every mission? How could he be so careless? Gaara would have dropped and killed that ninja on the spot for saying that but he had no other choice. He didn't want to tie him up and carry him on his back, he already had one backpack and so did Sasuke. Using his sand was going to slow him down a little, but he'd be okay if the prisoner didn't make him any trouble.

They left Otogakure and a few hours later they stopped because Sasuke needed some hours of sleep to keep going. He made a fire and took some food out of his backpack, using his kunai to cut the beef in three. Kay mentioned being in a mission before meeting them so he was probably hungry.

"Hey..." he said, looking at Gaara to make him let the ninja's hands free. "Are you hungry? It's not much, but..."

"No thanks!" Kay smiled. "But I'm a little thirsty. Could you give some water, please?"

"Sure." Sasuke replied, giving her a bottle of water. "What kekkai genkai was that? What clan are you from?" he asked, after she gave the bottle back to him. "And why are you wearing your hitae-ate over your eyes? I don't think you're blind."

Gaara frowned and he was right. That was a really stupid question.

"Uhm... actually, I have two bloodline limits. The first is that 'switch of places' you saw earlier and the second is the reason for which I wear the hitae-ate over my eyes."

"Well, you're lucky. Girls seem to fall in love with boys by looking in their eyes..." he muttered, remembering about all those crazy fan girls he used to have in Konoha.

Kay chuckled and eventually burst out into laughter. Gaara ignored that and thought about what he had said. Two bloodline limits. That would have been possible only if her parents had been from different clans. Such children were rather rare because it was said that the power of the kekkai genkai faded and eventually disappeared if mixed with other bloodlines.

"Get some rest, Sasuke." he said. "I want to get back to the Akatsuki by dawn."

"Fine. Make sure you won't kill him 'by accident'."

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"Ah, finally here. How did you mission go?" Pein asked, looking at the three ninja. "Sasuke, I heard you've had some problems with your health, are you better now?"

"Yes, Sir, I am."

"Well done, both of you. Now, young Kay, how about you sit down and talk to me?"

Gaara called his sand back into the gourd and the sound ninja turned to them smiling.

"Oh, guys, before this talking shit starts giving me headaches..." he whispered as his hand moved.

Sasuke watched her hand rising to the hem of her hitae-ate, pulling it up to reveal two perfectly black eyes, as his cheeks blushed and Gaara fidgeted a little.

"I'm a girl." she smirked, looking deep into Sasuke's identical eyes.


	5. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto & Co. **

**Thank you for your reviews. Uchiha-Gal18: I'm sorry to disappoint you but I'm not sure if there is going to be something between Sasuke and Itachi, but I can tell you there is going to be some UCHIHAcest in this story... you'll see what I'm talking about in the later chapters. I was thinking about some ItaSasu when I started this but then another idea hit me... I'm sorry for any spelling or grammar errors...**

**Chapter five: Hesitation**

Sasuke lay in his bed, half asleep, opening his eyes from time to time, staring lost at the ceiling. He couldn't forget those eyes, he saw them everytime he looked in a mirror, his eyes, identical to hers. No, hers identical to his, to his father's... how could that be?

"Can't sleep?"

"Did you notice?" Sasuke asked him in a voice he couldn't recognise as his own.

"Yes, I did. Stop worrying." Gaara whispered, placing a kiss on his forehead. "You should go to sleep. It's a torment to hear you complaining everytime Pein sends us in a mission early in the morning."

Sasuke held his hand out and clung to Gaara's shirt, pulling him down until their lips met. The red haired ninja let Sasuke pull him in the bed, next to him and smirked when the boy curled into a ball, resting his head on his chest.

"Who do you think she really is?" Sasuke asked, closing his eyes when Gaara's hand ran through his hair gently, white slender fingers tangling in the dark, silky locks.

"I don't know. I heard your brother's partner was killed in their last mission."

"Kisame? I always thought my brother didn't need a partner."

"If Pein wanted Kay to join the organization she'd be teamed with Itachi."

"Itachi's used to being in charge with everything and something tells me she's the one who can make his life seem no less than hell. It's almost funny to think at them trying to work as a team without killing each other..." he chuckled, loking for Gaara's lips with his eyes closed.

His search ended when Gaara decided he wouldn't wait any longer and kissed him, Sasuke being the one asking for a little more space to play in, running his tongue over his lover's lower lip. He was a bit shy at first but he knew that wouldn't be for long as he was almost greedy when it came for kisses.

He knew about Gaara's little scratch from his battle with Kay and looked for it with his lips on the boy's neck, feeling harsh sand moving slowly, which meant that his partner was calm. He looked for that scratch with his lips until he heard a low chuckle and rose his head to see a smile.

"Shukaku took care of that hours ago, Sasuke."

Somehow Gaara always seemed to know what was going on inside his head, as if he could read minds just as easily as he could read an open book.

"Is it true that you talk to the one-tailed beast?"

"Yeah. Not talk, argue."

"What does he tell you about me?"

Gaara leaned forward to kiss him again, whispering as Sasuke shuddered under his touches:

"Believe me, you don't want to know."

"How can you two cooperate if you can't stand for each other?"

"He needs me to survive and I need him for the same thing. If one of us dies, so will happen to the other. Cooperation is neccessary for survival."

Sasuke looked at Gaara and jumped out of bed.

"I have to talk to my brother about this girl. Maybe he knows something I don't and if that's true, he'd wish he was never born."

"Don't you think it's a little to late for chatting?"

"It's never too late to argue with my brother." he smiled, heading for the door.

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Itachi knew his brother was looking for trouble late at night and he also knew the little nuisance was going to get it if he walked into his room. He was tired (he had been forced to use the Tsukuyomi in the last mission), pissed off by the stupid loss of his partner (not that he cared too much but it was stupid for Kisame to die because he couldn't stop himself from drinking sake and choke with it) and, most of all, annoyed by the fact that every single headache in the world seemed to have gathered inside his head.

He couldn't lie in his bed because his back also hurt from carrying Kisame back to the headquarters so he was siting on the black couch, with his head in his right hand, staring at the pills on the table in front of him. Those damn pills couldn't make his headache go away and he was afraid that if he took more he'd be dead by morning.

The door closed behind Sasuke and the boy walked towards his brother, knowing that Itachi was watching him, but to his great surprise, he saw that his brother's sharingan was deactivated and his eyes were dark-brown, tired and empty. It was the first time Sasuke had ever seen his brother like that and he was absolutely sure it wasn't because of Kisame's death.

"Get out." Itachi growled, his eyes narrowing, almost boring holes through the table at which he was staring. Sasuke stiffened at the deadly tone, but didn't move. "Didn't you hear what I said?"

"I won't go. We need to talk."

"There's nothing for us to talk about. Now get out!" Itachi snapped angrily.

"You know about the girl Pein asked us to kidnap. Is she an Uchiha?"

The man glared at Sasuke and stood up, ignoring the pain in his back to slam the kid against a wall.

"I don't care who she is! I said **get out** and if you make me repeat it one more time, I'm going to beat the shit out of you before I kill you!"

"**Is she an Uchiha?**" Sasuke insisted, almost not realising he was playing with his life.

"Listen to me you little brat!" the S-class ninja growled. "I don't care if you are my brother or not and if you dare to defy me like that again I'll kill you for sure. Maybe you've forgotten what I am like, so don't make me remind you that!"

"Fine, I listened to you, now you listen to me!" Sasuke shouted, struggling in his brother's painful grip. "Is Kay an Uchiha or not?"

Itachi's eyes flickered to the deep crimson of the sharingan and Sasuke knew what was coming: Tsukuyomi. So, he had finally managed to piss his brother off so much that he was going to use the Tsukuyomi on him! But not even the sharingan activated and Itachi let Sasuke go, slightly staggering backwards with his hand over his eyes.

"Out... now." he hissed, the only thing making Sasuke obey being the tired tone.

After he heard the door close Itachi let himself fall on the floor, biting his lower lip angrily. Now his eyes hurt like hell. That damn nuisance. The next time he'll be playing around like that he'd wish he was never born. The Tsukuyomi must have affected his eyes so badly that even the sharingan was useless for a period of time after the use of the mangekyo.

Pein had told him about the girl because she was going to be his partner. It wasn't going to be long until his sight would deterriorate to the point of blindness. After that, the Akatsuki would get rid of him sooner or later. It was just a matter of time.

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"That damn bastard didn't tell me anything!" Sasuke growled, sitting on his bed. "He was too busy kicking me out of his... room." he muttered, suddenly realising that he was talking to nobody. "Now where the hell is Gaara?"

He stormed out of the room, heading for the kitchen to have a midnight snack and forget about everything for a few minutes. He wandered through the corridors and looked around, trying to recognise something, anything, because he was sure that he had gotten lost... what a great way to end his night! Getting lost in the Akatsuki headquarters with the cannibal Zetsu and S-class criminals... well, at least he knew no one would hurt him because he was also a member of the organization.

His heart jolted when he saw a very familiar door and without a second thought he pushed it open, thinking that he had finally found the kitchen, but instead, he found himself in the leader's office, with Pein staring at him surprised, his hand stopping from writing.

"Sasuke? What are you doing here so late?" he asked, standing on his feet elegantly. "Is there something wrong?"

"Uhm... actually..." he stammered out. "I... got lost."

Pein chuckled and invited him to sit.

"Well, if you're here I don't see any reason for which we shouldn't share a glass of wine. Do you like wine?"

"Yeah, sure." he mumbled, quite aware that he had never drunk wine in his entire life, maybe just a few sips of sake from time to time. "I'm sorry I..."

"It's no big deal. I really needed some company. How did you get lost? You and Gaara have been around here for almost a week!"

"He knows every corner of this place but I can't even remember where the kitchen is!" Sasuke blushed.

"You remind me of your brother."

"Itachi? I can't fancy him getting lost."

"But he did get lost around here a few times. I remember he once ended up in my private quarters. That was on his first day here. You two are incredibly alike."

"Are you sure this is Itachi you're talking about?"

"Perfectly sure." Pein smirked, handing him a glass of white wine. "Despite being younger than you when he joined us, his partner, Kisame almost feared him. I remember there were days when Kisame would come to me and say 'I'm telling you, this Uchiha is big trouble' and complain about how cruel and cold your older brother was. As time went by, he started to respect Itachi for who he was. I'm glad Gaara doesn't consider you big trouble. How are you two getting along?"

"Great. I had some doubts about being teamed with him at first but everything's okay now."

"And your brother? Did you two manage to get over your brotherly quarrel?"

"Is he okay?"

Pein raised an eyebrow in confusion.

"What do you mean 'okay'? Of course he's okay. What could be wrong with him?"

"I don't know. I saw him earlier and he didn't look pretty well. And there was something about his eyes..."

"Don't worry, Sasuke. Your brother is going to be okay. I'll make sure of that."

Sasuke realised that he didn't feel uncomfortable near this man any more. It was weird, but he now thought of him as a friend.

"Oh, may I ask you something?"

"I'm all ears."

"How's Kay?"

"She's fine. She'll move with Itachi tomorrow to form a team. I know it's a little weird, because she's a girl and she's going to share the room with a boy, but all teams share their rooms and, besides, there are no other rooms."

"Uhm... I don't want to be disrespectful but..."

"I know you're tired. You can go back to your room now. Do you want me to take you there?"

"No thank you. I'm sure I remember the way back. Thank you for everything, sir."

"You should get lost more often, Sasuke. It was nice talking to you."

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Gaara didn't even look at him when Sasuke entered the room. It was like the old Gaara was back...

"Hey. Where have you been?"

"Hn." the red-haired ninja replied. "On the roof."

"I'm feeling a little dizzy, I think I'm going to bed now."

"Drinking wine can make you dizzy."

Sasuke's eyes widened in surprise.

"How do you know I... never mind. You're acting as if you were jealous or something. I got lost and ended in his office, so he invited me to drink a glass of wine with him. Nothing more. Is that okay with you?"

"I'm not jealous and I didn't ask you anything. I just don't like Pein."

"I can take care of myself."

"I'm happy to hear that."

"What the hell is wrong with you? Why are you being so cold to me?"

"For no reason."

"Fine. Good night."

Sasuke hoped Gaara would be friendlier in the morning, so he went to sleep in his cold bed, fidgeting before falling asleep. With a little luck, Pein wouldn't wake them up early in the morning again.


	6. Chapter 6

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto & Co. **

**Chapter six: Secret**

Kay walked inside the room and immediately felt Itachi's chakra reacting a bit violently to her presence, as she went closer to that cold chakra pattern.

"Yeah, I'm not crazy for you either." she muttered, knowing that he was on the couch even if she couldn't see through her hitae-ate. She could almost feel Itachi's glare.

"You don't have to wear your hitae-ate here. I know who you are."

"I'm happy to hear that." she replied in an icy voice. "But I fear that if I get rid of my hitae-ate I won't be able to stop myself from throwing you in the nightmare I've been through all these years because of your family."

"Don't expect me to repair things. The ninny next door might be better than me in doing that."

"Things can't be repaired. And I don't remember you being so pathetic years ago. The Uchiha kekkai genkai is giving you a hard time, isn't it? You can't hide forever, Itachi."

"It doesn't matter. It would be useless for a medic-nin to try to heal my eyes. The damage the mangekyo inflicted is not natural. The only persons who could heal me are those who possess the mangekyo as well. My brother doesn't have the mangekyo yet and I wouldn't risk having my brain messed up by him, not to mention he doesn't have any healing chakra. I'd rather become blind."

"Liar." she sneered. "If you do change your mind, let me know."

Itachi stared at her in disbelief.

"Didn't your mother tell you it's rude to stare at people?" she smiled. "You Uchihas are always looking down at people. It's something Fugaku Uchiha left behind to me as well, but I manage to control it, unlike you."

"Take that thing off." Itachi glared. "Stop hiding behind it. My clan is dead and my brother is not a threat to you. Pure or not, you are an Uchiha."

"Tell that to your father."

"Take it off."

"I won't take orders from you."

Itachi ignored her tone and removed the hitae-ate covering her eyes with a single move, the girl's crimson sharingan burning angrily behind dark-red strands of hair. Her glare softened and she looked away, at the black curtains covering the window.

"If I change my mind?" he repeated what she had said earlier as if awaking from a dream. "It sounds like you have the mangekyo. I can't believe that girl who used to be so afraid of her own shadow and couldn't even kill a fly would kill her best friend for such power. What made you change your mind? If I remember well, you didn't even want to become a ninja."

"People change, unlike you. And I never said I had the magekyo sharingan." she sneered.

Itachi sighed in irritation. He still remembered that summer when her mother, the most beautiful gipsy he had ever seen, brought the little girl to see her father. Fugaku Uchiha. Kay and her mother were very alike. The same bloody-fire red hair, the same white, perfect skin, no freckles, the same elegant moves of their slender silhouettes... but the woman was calm and, somehow fluid and her daughter was burning like the most fierce fire. She couldn't stay in one place for long and she'd always get into trouble somehow. Sasuke was four, the girl was one or two years older, he didn't remember that exactly, but his little brother was not home. Mikoto had taken him elsewhere, she knew about the girl and she resended seeing her and her mother, so she had decided to protect Sasuke, because he was too young to understand. Itachi remembered Mikoto had wanted to take him with her as well, but he had refused. He was old enough and he was not affected by such silly things, although he couldn't imagine how Fugaku Uchiha had been so stupid to have a crush on a gipsy when he already had Mikoto as the most carring and loving wife, not to mention mother of his two sons.

-Flashback-

_He was nine and his sharingan had activated a year ago so he was now using it most of the time, training to see how far he could push the limits of his kekkai genkai, eager to learn more about it. Kay had come to him one day, watching him until he growled in displeasure and turned around to meet the same dark eyes he had when his sharingan was not hiding them._

"_What?" he asked, crossing his arms._

"_What's that thing glowing in your eyes?"_

"_Hn. Sharingan. My family's bloodline limit, but you're too young to understand and I'm not in the mood to lecture you about this. Now, go away. I'm busy."_

"_It looks weird."_

"_You'll have it one day as well."_

"_I'll hide it. It looks useless anyway."_

"_It's not. Bloodline limits are the most powerful weapons ninjas have. You should be proud. This clan is one of the most powerful in Konoha."_

"_I'm not a part of it." she sneered. "My name is not Kay Uchiha, but Kay Inverse, from Kirigakure! Your clan is stupid!"_

"_Would you like to see what death is like?" he hissed._

_Kay frowned and her body was covered by a thick cloud of smoke, which disappeared quickly, revealing a perfect copy of Itachi, who stiffened at the sight of the girl's other kekkai genkai. The ability to transform into someone else. That, combined with the power of the sharingan she'd have later, would make Kay able to become any other person and not only copy the body and personality, but also the abilities, using the sharingan. Too bad she was stupid enough not to want to become a ninja and use those powers. _

_It was like he was looking into a mirror and although he knew about the Inverse clan's amazing kekkai genkai, it was still astonishing to look at himself. It was weird that such transformations were supposed to be devouring chakra at a fast pace, but Kay never had such problems. _

-End of flashback-

"So, you're going to become blind in... a few months?" she asked, her sharingan fading to a perfectly still black.

"Hn. Three weeks or least."

"Well, that's worst than I thought. You know, your little brother is worried about you."

"I don't care. How do you know that? Have you been spying again?"

"No, but he should stay away from the second floor. Pein isn't as nice as I am."

Itachi gazed at her and she smiled, with a slight blush.

"What have you done?" he asked.

"I was just... looking through some papers in Pein's office when your brother came in. He had mistaken the office for the kitchen and I though it was funny so I invited him to drink a glass of wine with me. Luckily, I had transformed into Pein before invading the bastard's office so he didn't suspect anything, but I'm afraid I've been too friendly to him. It's probably because Pein would have done the same if he was there at that moment. We talked about everything that came up to my mind, then he asked me about you... and I started telling him about how you were when you first came here. It wasn't easy for me to play around with Pein's memory... but the kid got the point and cheered up. Really, you shouldn't be so mean to him. He cares about you. Besides, we both know you lied to him years ago."

Itachi sighed loudly and leaned back, closing his eyes.

"That was a long time ago. The truth wouldn't change anything now."

"How bad is your sight?"

"I can only see dim light and colours. It's not better when my sharingan is activated and whether I use the magekyo or not is not important anymore. It keeps getting worst every day."

"Would you let me heal you if I had the mangekyo?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"I don't trust you."

"So... you'd rather stay blind and give Pein the opportunity to get rid of you. How cute. I know you were stubborn when you were young, as well as nowadays, but stupidity is not something I remember about you."

"Mind your own business."

"It's one of the things I hate doing."

"Well this is something you should learn. Almost all the Akatsuki members are cold-blooded assassins."

"Am I supposed to be afraid? Your brother is strong enough to handle this without getting himself killed, why shouldn't I be able to do that?"

"You are stronger than him, but you also have a bigger mouth. Keep it closed."

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After a few hours of sparring with Deidara, Sasuke went back to his room, hoping to find a less annoyed Gaara. He had been moody all morning after their little quarrel, but Sasuke knew that would have to change sooner or later.

He walked along the corridor with steady strides, but then he slowed down until his feet stopped moving right in front of Itachi's room. He could hear his brother's voice and Kay's, much lower, cool and calculated, but he couldn't hear every word. Sasuke decided he didn't want to listen, mostly because it wasn't polite and secondly, because the risk of being caught by one of the two was incredibly discouraging.

He entered his room and leaned on the door, waiting for his eyes to get used to the dark before walking to his bed to get some much needed rest. Gaara's chakra was nowhere near, he couldn't feel anything at all so he thought he was probably spending some time far from the headquarters to clear his mind.

Just when Sasuke made a step towards where his bed was supposed to be, somebody pushed him back against the door with a force the boy recognised immediately and he held his arms out to embrace the perfect body of his partner.

"W-what's the time?" Sasuke asked, unable to keep a moan for himself when Gaara's warm hands slid like rattle snakes under his shirt.

"Hmmm... you're late." the other purred in a soft voice, making Sasuke shiver at the sound of it. "Where were you all day?"

"Sparring with Deidara. You weren't in one of your best moods so I thought it would be better for you to be alone for a while. I would have only pissed you off more."

"Actually, you were thinking about saving your own life." Gaara hissed, giving him a peck on his lips. "You should know I would kill you even if I were in a good mood."

The only person he had ever loved so much would kill him without a second thought, despite every little moment they shared as 'lovers'. It was obvious that he was not as important to Gaara as Gaara was to him. Was he just pretending to love him? It hurt so damn much to think about it...

Sasuke lowered his head in defeat. It was true, he feared Gaara for some reason, probably because he knew how mercilessly he used to be when he was young (not that things had changed much) but the other feeling was stronger. He cared too much for the sand ninja, although the latter was still cold and deadly. Maybe it was better this way. He didn't want to know how he'd feel if Gaara would ignore him instead of pretending to love him.

"Well I'm... I'm..." he stammered out, hoping his voice wouldn't sound as pathetic and weak as he was. "I was expecting you to say that."

"Liar." Gaara simply smirked. "You can't deny what you feel, can you? What a pity."

"Shut up." Sasuke muttered, making a step forward to lean against Gaara's body. The sand ninja didn't seem surprised, he didn't reject the boy, on the contrary, he wrapped his arms around him, kissing his neck lightly. "Why are you pretending to love me?" the raven-haired ninja whispered slowly.

"I never said I was pretending."

There was nothing that could make Sasuke more confused than that. He would have burst into tears there and then if it hadn't been for those loving touches and gentle kisses and he knew he wouldn't be able to do it later either, because he would still remember how it was like to be safe in Gaara's arms, behind all that confusion. Whether the red-haired ninja loved him or not, Sasuke needed attention, fake or not.


	7. Chapter 7

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto & Co. **

**Chapter seven: Unmasked Face**

Kay opened her eyes with a loud yawn, followed by a deep growl, then walked lazily towards the door, running a hand through her long, red hair, tousling it in a way which made her look like a spoiled, but cute girl who had just been woken up from the most beautiful dream. Whoever was knocking at that damn door was going to get kicked in the ass.

"I don't know where Itachi is, so fuck off!" she muttered, with her eyes closed, leaning on the door dressed only in a long, black t-shirt. "Oh, hey Sasuke. What are doing here so early?"

"I was... uhm... actually it's not very early. It's eleven a.m. I wanted to ask you if you'd like to spar with me today. You sure look like you'd love to rip my head off my shoulders for waking you up." he smiled.

"No, first torture you, then rip your head off, but since this is the first time you've made this mistake, I'll be nice and pretend nothing happened. And yes, I'd love to spar with you today. Just give me an hour to get... ready." she smirked.

"Okay. I'll see you in an hour on the training grounds."

She closed the door and turned to Itachi, still smiling.

"Your little brother is a bit impatient, isn't he?"

"He's your brother as well. You're not very different when it comes for impatience."

"Well, I'm sure that's one of your clan's traits. Sasuke and I don't have the same mother so it must be the Uchiha blood. I'm sure you're not as patient as you pretend to be either, Itachi. After hiding behind lies all my life, I have become immune to other people's lies and make-believes."

"I've noticed."

"Are you sure you want to let the kid spar with me? I also seem to have become uncontrolable when it comes for fighting."

"Believe me, he won't give up easily. The last thing he'll probably do will be spit his killer in the face before dying if there is ever going to be a killer."

"Well then, I'd better get ready."

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Sasuke was ready to go after Kay when he finally saw her running towards him, breathing heavily.

"I'm sorry I'm... late!" she sighed, collapsing on the ground to catch her breath. "I... realised I was a bit hungry before I left the room and went to the kitchen, found some chocolate and forgot about our sparring! I'm addicted to chocolate... thanks for waiting for me and again, I'm really really sorry!"

"No problem." he smiled, wondering why was she still wearing the hitae-ate over her eyes when he knew what was hiding behind it. "I didn't know you liked sleeping lately! I hate getting up early too, although I must admit you're lazier than me!"

She laughed and jumped on her feet. Sasuke was surprised at how fast she had caught her breath. She was dressed in a red t-shirt and black shorts. Her left arm and leg where hidden behind white wrappings and she was wearing shoes similar to those worn by a ballerina, as well as something which looked very much like what Lee used to wear over his ninja sandals, only that the colour was red instead of orange and it was going okay with the her black shoes and the rest of the outfit. Simple and rather boyish, but that didn't matter to her. No wonder he had mistaken her for a shinobi the first time they had met. All the kunoichis he knew were rather feminine and careful about their clothes, but Kay seemed to hide the fact that she was a girl and she was damn good at it.

"So, are you ready?" Sasuke asked, making a few steps backwards.

She nodded and stood perfectly still on the grass, no attack pose, not even a defensive one and Sasuke was a bit confused. How was she going to protect herself like that? Her head was bent down a little, red hair loose in a waterfall over her small shoulders. The boy's mind analysed some things before deciding what to do. Judging by the fact that her left arm and leg were protected by white wrappings, she was left-handed, so he had to attack her on the right side, where it would be harder for her to block his attacks. Secondly, she had her hitae-ate over her eyes, meaning that she was completely blind and thirdly, her kekkai genkai. She had mentioned she had two: one of them was the one Sasuke knew, the ability to copy somebody else's body, but the second was a mystery to him, although he knew it was in her eyes.

"_I'd better be careful._" he thought, activating his sharingan to make sure he wouldn't be taken by surprise.

He ran towards her, ready to punch, but her her forearm easily blocked the attack and Sasuke was forced to dodge a powerful blow that would have definitly hurt a lot. She wasn't playing around, that was for sure. His elbow made contact with her ribs painfully for both of them, but neither expressed that pain. Her right hand gripped his wrist with a strength that reminded him of Itachi's and he thought he didn't want to know just how much of that strength she had in her left arm, with which she was now adjusting her headband. He kicked, aiming for her hip, but she dodged the attack and let him go, with a graceful leap backwards.

"_Okay, so much for taijutsu. Let's try something more interesting._" Sasuke's heart started to beat faster at this thought and his chakra flow rippled, reflecting his growing impatience.

"Uhm, do you mind taking your headband off?" he asked. "I feel like I have an advantage and I'd like this to be a fair fight."

She chuckled, with her arms akimbo.

"You silly... who said you had an advantage? This is a fair fight. If I took my headband off, any advantage in this fight would be mine."

"It's not fair! I'm using my kekkai genkai! Why aren't you using yours? I don't care if you have two! Use everything you have against me! None of my enemies would avoid using their every weapon to kill me! Neither should you! I don't want you to play with me! Fight, damn it!"

"Listen kid, I don't fight, I kill. Fighting with me means dying and I doubt that's what you want right now."

"I want to see just how powerful you are. I can take the risk of getting killed."

"Fine then." she sighed. "But I don't want to hear any of your crying later."

Her hands untied the knot of the headband and it fell on the grass as she stepped over it, her black eyes piercing Sasuke's mercilessly. His heart was now beating amazingly fast, fed by the impatience and anxiety inside him. His sharingan analysed some hand signs she made but he couldn't copy those and he immediately knew she was going to use a kekkai genkai against him. A thick cloud of smoke covered her and after it disappeared, Sasuke was more than surprised to see Gaara.

"What the-"

"You told me to use my kekkai genkai." she cut him off harshly. "So I did."

Sasuke recognised Gaara's handsigns for the Sand Coffin, but remembered that she had no sand to use the jutsu against him. Then what was she doing? The reply came immediately, when he felt the ground moving under his feet and cracks appeared, tiny particles of sand gripping him tightly in less than a few seconds, making him unable to move. He knew that if he could get that sand wet somehow he'd be free, but he couldn't move his hands to perform the only water jutsu he had been able to learn. He smirked and started to struggle in the strong grip, already feeling it soften around him as he brushed his skin against the sand harder and harder.

Kay didn't have Gaara's pure control over sand and she couldn't control individual particles. If he could make himself sweat, it would have been enough for the jutsu to break. She must have felt that and wasting her chakra was definitly not a priority so the sand released Sasuke and she disappeared, making him more alert than he had ever been. He didn't know why, maybe it was because his subconscious knew she was damn dangerous, no matter how nice she seemed, there was something she was hiding. Hate, regret, sorrow, anger, negative feelings, all of them building her chakra in a violent, almost unstable structure.

"Show me your other kekkai genkai." he told her as she reappeared metres away from him, being herself once again. "Why is it such a big secret? I bet Itachi knows what it is!"

"Well then ask him." she replied bluntly.

"This fight is not as I thought it would be." he sighed.

Kay smirked and moved at a speed Sasuke didn't expect her to be able to reach so he was taken aback by the hard blow which she used against him, throwing him metres backwards, in a tree. Hardly had he gotten up when she came, kicking him in the ribs, on the right side of his body. He barely had time to roll over to one side when she attacked again, nearly hitting his shoulder with a chakra infused punch that would have surely dislocated it, if not worst. He aimed a kick for her stomach but missed as she jumped backwards, giving him a short time to get up and fight properly.

"That's more like it!" he smirked, wiping away a drop of blood from the corner of his mouth.

She was incredibly fast, sometimes too fast even for his sharingan to catch glimpses of her. The other ninja girls he knew were much more slower than the boys, but again, she proved to him that she was not less than a shinobi.

"So, you want to defeat Itachi?" she sneered.

"No, I want to kill him."

"Impossible."

"I'm not weak!"

"I didn't say you were weak, I said it's impossible for you to kill Itachi." she replied calmly.

"Why?"

"Because he's too stubborn to trust anyone. Have you ever felt his mangekyo?"

"No. It would have been better if I had."

Kay smiled.

"You think seeing the power it could give you would make it easier for you to kill your best friend? As far as I can see, you wouldn't be able to do it anyway. Your heart won't allow it."

"I doubt it."

"Then let me show you." she sneered.

Her black eyes turned deep scarlet, glowing with the same intensity his own sharingan had. He shuddered at the thought that she was indeed an Uchiha, his own flesh and blood, but then another thing came to his mind. He wasn't alone. His expression softened and he made one step back. Kay pinned him against a tree before he even knew it and her sharingan burned deeper and deeper, becoming what Sasuke never knew he feared so much until he started to shiver at the sight of it: the mangekyo sharingan. Frozen in horror, he felt his feet unable to sustain him much longer and he would have let himself glide on his knees if it hadn't been for Kay to keep him standing. Sasuke couldn't think clear any more. He knew it was too late to admit that he wasn't yet prepared to face the magekyo and he also knew that he'd never be able to achieve it. He wasn't brave enough. Tears stung his eyes and he pushed his body against the tree, as if wanting to go right through it. He couldn't bare that look in her eyes, calm and deadly, able to torture him endlessly in the most horrible ways. Sasuke's eyes closed almost unwillingly, his heart appeared to have stopped beating for a few moments, then everything came back to life as the grip on his shoulders was gone and he was free to glide along tree until he felt grass under his knees and barely stopped himself from crying. He had already been pathetic enough.


	8. Chapter 8

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto & Co. **

**Chapter eight: The Unexpected**

The light made his eyes hurt, but he finally managed to open them, although rather shyly, still with no control over the rest of his body. Kay snatched her hand out of Itachi's grip and stuck her tongue at him, her sharingan now deactivated. Sasuke didn't want his brother to see him like that, looking so... weak. But it was already too late. Itachi glared at him for one second, then he walked back from where he came from, Kay following him closely, growling angrily. Sasuke felt like nothing more than a tiny grain of sand in their eyes...

He only wanted to get back in his room without actually getting up to do it. If he hadn't known there was someone there who could comfort him he would have wished nothing more than death, but the thought of being greeted by Gaara, who happened to be in a very good mood that morning, no matter how cold and distant he was, was enough to chase that thought away. How much would it take him to get back to his room? Less than five minutes, hoping he wouldn't get lost on his way there, mostly because the first floor was not less than a labirinth of corridors.

If his mind had been working without any physical reaction of his body until then, now his feet moved without him, staggering towards the entrance as if he were drunk. His mind made no connection to the rest of the body he was supposed to control. What had affected him more? The fact that she was an Uchiha, that she had almost used her mangekyo on him to prove that he was nothing more than the shadow of a true ninja, his brother, or that he had lost the battle against what he had wanted so much to achieve?

Suprisingly, he didn't get lost and he was taken aback to see himself right in front of the door to his only shelter. And the knight in shining armour would come on his white horse to protect him? How silly he felt thinking about Gaara being the knight... Sasuke pushed the door open and closed it, going straight to the window to pull the curtains over it for the darkness much needed, then he threw himself on the bed and curled up in a shuddering ball of flesh and feelings. Both his flesh and his feelings hurt like hell.

The slight click of the bathroom door didn't even make him wink. The silence was so deep that if he had paid attention he could have heard Gaara's muffled steps approaching. The dark-haired boy didn't have time to realise that he was doing it on purpose, because Gaara's walking was always as soundless as if he were floating inches from the ground. A warm hand touched Sasuke's cheek, slender fingers playing with black strands of hair, exploring along the skin of his neck. He only closed his eyes: numbness had taken over him again. The air moved, bringing some warmth, which he recognised as his partner's steady breathing without actually thinking about it. Wet lips met his temple, a weak shiver rippling through his body in reply. The lips seemed to curve in a smile and Sasuke knew he had felt that shiver as well, that he was somewhat pleased about it. A strong arm sneaked over his chest like a snake, but didn't force him to turn around. The lips moved on his cheek. It was a nice way of persuading him to cooperate... but Sasuke felt himself too weak for that. It was not until Gaara's hand went under his shirt that Sasuke finally decided he was clever enough not to let those touches go away when he needed them so much. He could still feel the smile on the sand ninja's lips when he kissed him. He had probably been expecting him to give up so easily, but Sasuke knew he was like an open book to him.

"Well, that took long enough." Gaara sighed, when they broke the kiss for air, but Sasuke knew he wasn't talking about the kiss. "Guess that spar with Kay was a little more than you expected?"

"Yeah... sort of... I was right about her being an Uchiha."

"Then why are you so... not you?"

"You won't believe this... I have no idea."

Gaara shook his head with a sigh and leaned in to kiss him again, lovingly. It was Sasuke's turn to smile with a slight blush, thankful that it was dark enough for his lover not so see. He felt Gaara's chakra twist violently and the sand ninja made a sudden move to push Sasuke away.

"Are you okay?" he asked in confusion. "I felt..."

"I'm fine." Gaara replied coldly.

"Don't lie to me. You're not fine!"

"Shut up." he muttered under his breath, looking away. "You don't know anything about me."

"What's with this sudden change of attitude?" Sasuke frowned. "Wait... is it Shukaku? Is he..."

"No!" he hissed threateningly. "I'm okay."

"So, you're hiding something from me just like those two relatives of mine! I thought I could trust you!"

Gaara glared at him.

"I thought I told you before, stubborn he-goat. I'm going to tell you one more time so make sure you listen this time: you **cannot** trust me. If I should have to chose between your life and completing a mission you'd better start praying. I might not hesitate."

"Oh, you **might** not... I think I could get used to that. No one ever cared about me anyway."

"That's not going to impress me you know."

"Maybe I can't trust you, but you can trust me. You lied to me, right? It **was **Shukaku. What did he tell you this time?"

"None of your business."

"C'mon! You've just admitted it was Shukaku! Tell me the rest of it! It can't be that hard!"

"Shut up... or I'll kill you. You're wasting my time."

"I seem to be the one wasting everybody else's time around here!"

"Sometimes, you really are."

Sasuke glared at him, then sighed and went back to his bed, waving a hand at Gaara:

"Whatever... just don't pull those curtains, okay? I'm starting to have a headache..."

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"You can let go of me now, Itachi. I'm not going anywhere." Kay sighed, making one last attempt to free her wrist from the man's tight grip. "You know I wouldn't have hurt him."

"Mangekyo, huh?" he hissed, turning around to face her. "I don't care about what you could have done to that foolish little brother of ours. At least he has finally learned his lesson."

"Then what's the problem?"

"Don't waste your sight and chakra on him. He's not worth it."

"I **could** heal your eyes if you'd let me to!" she protested, trying to snatch her wrist from his ferm grip again, but with no result. He only pulled her closer, his eyes piercing hers even if his sight was severely deterriorated and he probably couldn't see too much. "But... but you said you wouldn't let me... don't tell me you've changed your mind, 'cause I don't believe you."

"No, I haven't changed my mind. I still don't trust you."

"Oh, then what should I do to make you trust me before it's too late and your sight goes 'bye-bye'?"

"Spar with me."

"**WHAT??? **Are you nuts?!? All right, who are you and what have you done with Itachi?"

"Then don't do it. It's your choice."

She lowered her head and his grip suddenly softened a little.

"Listen... I **do **care about you. Whatever happened in the past should be forgotten. I don't want to be accepted by your clan anymore and I'm not trying to get closer to you for that... but we still have the same blood. I am your sister... or half of a sister... or... even less, but that doesn't really matter. I don't like to see you or that kid suffer. You don't deserve it and I know it. Why didn't you tell him the truth? He's old enough to know."

"He'll never be too old enough to accept it."

"I'm sorry, but I think you're wrong about him. He has the right to know! C'mon, give the kid a chance! I know he's a little scared now because of the mangekyo, but he'll get over it soon. I'm sure he'll be able to achieve it as well."

"By killing Naruto? Or worst, by killing his partner? I doubt that will ever happen. He's not like us. He doesn't really want the mangekyo or the truth he's supposed to be old enough to know. And... I don't want to remember the truth either."

"Okay, enough is enough: where's the real Itachi?" she smirked.

"I don't want to tell you."

"Is there anything you do want?"

"Yeah..."

She noticed the look in his eyes and a sudden feeling of guilt struck her. She should have told him she had the magekyo sharingan earlier. It could have been too late already. Kay didn't know why she wanted so much to heal his sight, but she was determined to do anything for the chance he was willing to give her. But something else was hiding behind that look.

"Fine I'll do it. I'll spar with you. Ready to do it now?" she asked and he finally released her wrist, giving her a slight nod. "Okay then. Let's go."

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Sasuke cried out with his face buried in the pillow and Gaara had to roll him over without being either kicked or punched and slap him over the face to be able to wake him up from whatever nightmare (daymare actually...) he was having.

"What the fuck-" Sasuke snapped, jolting in pain.

Gaara cursed under his breath, somehow letting him w he was already pissed off. The dark-haired ninja sat up, staring at him, breathing heavily while clunching to his shirt as if he wanted to tear his heart out of his chest.

"I..." he panted, managing to stand without staggering like a drunk man "... I feel... something's going on!"

"Things are going on all the time, Sasuke." Gaara told him in a low voice.

"No... something..." he muttered, striding towards the door.

"Where are you going?"

"Are you coming?"

Gaara let out a sigh of irritation, but followed his partner out of the room and eventually out of the headquarters, apparently heading towards the huge Akatsuki training hall, an impressive building dominating the training grounds. It wasn't a very nice weather for sparring outside so whoever decided they needed to relax by killing each other had to do it inside. Gaara stopped for a moment in the rain, feeling Shukaku growing impatient for some reason he didn't know yet.

Sasuke stopped, ignoring the amazing building which was very much the same with the one in which the chunin preliminaries had taken place. The two ninja facing each other in the middle of the huge hall were not fighting yet, but their chakras were twisting violently, almost visible around their bodies. He had never seen his brother like this, he seemed to have lost most of his inner composure, although his face was as expressionless as always. Kay wasn't smiling, like she used to when she was about to start another fight, she was simply gazing at Itachi with a fierce look in her eyes, no sharingan burning scarlet in their eyes.

"If you want to watch this, let's watch it from above. It will be much more interesting." Gaara told him, pulling him upstairs, from where they had a better view of the fight.

"Omfg... what are they fighting for?" Sasuke asked his partner, who merely shrugged, looking at the two with his arms crossed.

"Judging by their personalities, it's a miracle that they haven't killed each other yet. It was about time they had a serious fight."

"But what if one of them really dies tonight?!"

"Look at their faces. None of them is willing to give up easily."

The two chakras were now like two dragons biting at each other. Sasuke couldn't even control his breathing and he could feel Gaara's excitement bursting out in little sparkles of chakra and sand racing against his skin madly. He didn't know for how long he could stay there and watch his siblings gazing at each other like that. It was overwhelming.


	9. Chapter 9

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto & Co. **

**Chapter nine: Giving Up**

Her arm felt numb and still, she found the strenght to hold it out and push her other arm backwards, bent in a sharp angle, doing the same with her legs so that she was now in a both defensive and offensive stand. Itachi remained motionless, still feeling her every move with his chakra, avoiding to use his sight.

"_By any means neccessary..._"

His voice still lingered in her thoughts, echoing endlessly, like a curse upon her, but she had to play by his rules if she wanted to get closer to the Uchiha prodigy. Was he underestimating her or was she overestimating herself? There was only one way to find out.

Sasuke looked at the stand she had taken. It seemed very familiar to him and he knew he was right when he heard Gaara chuckle next to him.

"She has fought with a Hyuga."

"But she can't copy the Hyuga kekkai genkai, right? Without it, she can't see where she needs to hit in order to make Itachi's chakra flow collapse."

"I've heard than the Inverse clan's kekkai genkai is one of the oldest. They are said to be able to transform into perfect clones of whoever they manage to hurt. If she has touched one single drop of the Hyuga blood, then she should be able to copy it perfectly and that includes the Byakugan. However, the complexity of this transformation requires a lot of chakra so she might not be able to use it for long."

"If such a dangerous kekkai genkai exists, why haven't I heard of it until now? I'm not a nerd, but it's something we should have been taught at the ninja academy."

"The reason for which genins and most of the chunins never find out about this is the fact that the memebers of the Inverse clan have always been hunted by the Kages. Their kekkai genkai is considered dangerous and you can see why."

Sasuke looked at Kay, who had just finished making some hand signs and whose body was immediately covered by smoke. As soon as it vanished, Gaara's lips curved slightly, his eyes now watching the current Hokage of Konoha: Neji Hyuga.

"You were right!" the dark-haired ninja said, looking at the Hyuga's clone in complete amazement.

"Some history never killed anyone. I read about it a long time ago." Gaara shrugged as a reply to Sasuke's inquiring gaze.

It was like watching the preliminaries again, at least for Gaara, who had seen the fight between Neji and his cousin, Hinata. Kay used her hands to perform some other hand signs and her lips moved to let out one word:

"Byakugan!"

She immediately attacked, with the same precise blows the Hyugas used, aiming for the weak points in Itachi's chakra flow, but the ninja could block her every hit without much effort, even if he was nearly blind. Kay continued to keep Itachi busy, showing no sign of feeling uncomfortable as Neji's clone.

Kay aimed for a weak point in his shoulder but her hand was blocked by Itachi's forearm and he caught her wrist in a tight grip, using his ANBU knowledge and precision to break it in less than a few seconds. She jumped backwards, showing no sign of pain, her wrist held in her other hand, pushing the bone back in its socket effortlessly. She knew there was no time to waste because she was already losing chakra.

A second attempt to hit those weak points started better than the first, Itachi being unable to stop her hand from reaching his ribs and send a wave of pain through his body. Kay was already slowing down because of the transformation devouring her chakra and that allowed the other ninja to strike at top speed. She staggered backwards under the intensity of the hit, Neji's clone seemed to melt in the smoke and her real body replaced it. A smile flew across her lips and she attacked Itachi again, using only taijutsu, probably because she needed some time before being able to use her chakra again.

"I thought I told you to do something." Itachi told her as he caught her fist in his hand, glaring at her. "Don't make me force you to do it."

"Don't be stupid, Itachi, you know I can't..."

She barely had time to dodge a chakra infused blow. The S-class ninja went after her before she could brace herself for the next attack. Sasuke couldn't believe his brother could defeat her so easily despite her unbelievable skill and talent as a ninja . He had no chance to defeat Itachi as long as he couldn't even face her.

"Fine then." she muttered, getting away from Itachi to buy some time. Sasuke and Gaara both recognised the same chakra weights Lee used to wear on his feet as she bent down to get rid of them. Once she had removed the 300 lb on each foot, Kay was able to move so fast that Sasuke couldn't even see her until she reached for Itachi and attacked fiercely. He dodged, she went on the other side in less than two or three seconds, almost not giving him any time to brace himself for the hit.

Sasuke knew Itachi wouldn't be able to avoid being hit without the sharingan for much longer. He looked at Gaara from the corner of his eyes, but the red head didn't bother with him because he was too busy watching the fight. Again, the leaf ninja found himself wondering what was shukaku telling Gaara all the time. He looked back down in the arena, where his brother had stopped for a moment, looking around to catch glimpses of Kay who only let a slight trace of dust behind her.

Itachi looked forward and closed his eyes, summoning his chakra. He didn't have time for more, he knew Kay was already on her way. A slight feeling of pain shot through his eyes but it disappeared just as fast as it came, making him a bit more confident that it was safe to open his eyes and use his sharingan.

Sasuke stared at his brother and saw the crimson sharingan burning just for a second before Itachi let out a growl of pain and covered his eyes with his forearm, grinding his teeth angrily, his free hand curling up in a solid fist. Kay stopped and immediately went to him, worry now visible on her face.

"What the hell happened?" Sasuke asked almost in a whisper.

There was no need for Gaara to give him an explanation because the red-haired kunoichi had already managed to remove Itachi's forearm from his eyes and both boys could see blood pouring like tears on the pale cheeks of the Uchiha, whose eyes were now tightly closed.

"I guess it's the Uchiha bloodline limit." Gaara shrugged.

"The sharingan? No. The mangekyo sharingan maybe. So this was what he has been hiding from me ever since I got here. I never knew it was this bad!"

He glared at the currently blind Itachi, Kay's voice coming to his ears in a soft whisper that was addressed to her partner.

"Let's go, stubborn."

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He was lying in his bed. His ebony-black hair was moist because of the sweat caused by his high fever and darkened even more by a trail of dry blood which Kay hadn't managed to wipe off yet. And his face... his face was so pale that it almost seemed to be made of snow. She touched it gently. So cold... She could barely hear a faint breathing coming from him but that was all. Something like that could not be mistaken for a normal sleep. He didn't move, neither did he let out small murmurs, he didn't frown, he didn't smile like when dreams unroll in the mind of the one who is asleep. It was only immobility and the faint thread of breath.

"Come on..." she whispered. "Wake up. I have to start healing your eyes but you have to be awake..."

"I'm awake." he murmured weakly.

"Why didn't you say so?!" she snapped, leaning in to him. "Don't open your eyes. I don't want the bleeding to start all over again 'cause I'm not so sure I'll be able to stop it this time. How do you feel?"

"Hn... had better days."

"Do you trust me now?"

"How much is it going to take?"

"Well..."

She thought for a moment, frowning in the dark. Light would have only made things worse for him.

"I think it'll take a few days. The anatomy of the human eyes is extremely difficult and there's a lot of damage in your eyes that I have to deal with. You mustn't open your eyes and avoid light. I'll take care of that. Besides... it might hurt. Does it hurt now? And Itachi, don't even try to lie to me."

"It feels like my eyes are on fire. Happy now?" he hissed.

"Yeah. Happy to know it hurts you." she sneered, concentrating her chakra in her palms to start healing. "Okay, don't move. It'll only take a few minutes. Ready?"

"Aa."

Itachi felt like a thousand sharp needles went in and out of his eyes at the same time, with an incredible speed. He also felt Kay's warm chakra over them, but that was just a small comfort. Suprisingly, he didn't react to that pain, despite the fact that it was the most horrible thing he had ever experienced. It was like every single nerve inside his body had become numb, refusing to send the ripples of that pain throughout his entire body.

"It will hurt less... once I close the wounds." she told him, her voice quavering a little.

He knew it was the lack of chakra that made her voice sound like that. She hadn't had any time to recover the chakra she had lost in the fight.

For no obvious reason, the images of the fight in the training hall disappeared and were replaced by the image of his little brother's partner, the one-tailed beast. Itachi didn't know what made him think about that sand demon when his worries were completely different at that moment, but whatever that was he had a bad feeling about it.

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Sasuke came out of the bathroom, using a towel to dry his hair after a looong, nice bath. He looked around and raised an eyebrow in confusion. Gaara's gourd was next to his bed, but there was no sight of the red head. He didn't go anywhere without that thing. The dark-haired ninja remembered the first time he had tried to touch the gourd... an hour of pain and boredom in Gaara's chakra infused sand had been enough to teach him that lesson well. But now things were different: the sand ninja wasn't in the bathroom, where he was safe and he didn't need sand to protect him, so he was wandering somewhere in the Akatsuki headquarters where no one was actually safe and he had left his gourd in his room.

Sasuke got dressed and after a few more minutes of waiting he wanted to go after Gaara, but thought that it would take him hours to find him and so he came up with another bright idea. Touch the gourd, even with the risk of going through a few hours of torment. Maybe the red head wouldn't be so cruel now that they were closer to each other. Keeping that in mind, he strode towards the gourd and stopped in front of it, kneeling on the floor. He took a deep breath and slowly moved his hand towards the gourd, his fingertips touching its harsh surface shyly. Nothing happened. Sasuke now had his palm on the weird vessel and still nothing happened. He moved it over the surface and removed the cork, closing his eyes in anticipation, but the sand inside remained unmoved.

What if... no, Gaara couldn't be dead. If he were, the gourd would have... melted in nothing more than sand. There was still **his** chakra keeping it in one piece. But then why was it not reacting? Where was Gaara? Sasuke was sure the other ninja could feel that he was inspecting his gourd again, so why didn't he give him a sign? Just when he was about to give up, there was a slight move inside the vessel and in the next second he had his hand pinned to the gourd by the sand inside.

"I told you to mind your own business." Gaara's cold voice came from behind.


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter ten: Shallow**

Sasuke wanted to ask him where he had been but when he saw the look upon his face he decided not to. Gaara didn't seem pretty happy and he was certainly not interested in being interrogated. The sand released the leaf ninja's hand faster than he would have thought, but he stood there, not moving an inch, just getting up from the floor, his eyes fixed upon his partner.

The red-haired boy ignored him and went to his bed, lying with his face down, buried in the pillow. Sasuke stood there until he realised that he probably looked like an idiot, so he decided to take a chance and find out what his partner had been up to.

"Uhm... something wrong?" he asked, not sure what to begin with. Gaara needed a long time to answer and when he did, the answer was a low 'hn'. Sasuke sat on his bed, trying to make him do something, anything, to let him know that he had nothing to do with his bad mood. "You're not going to sleep, are you?"

"Of course I'm not." he replied in the same cold voice.

"Will you please talk to me about this? I feel guilty."

"Well don't." Gaara snapped, finally getting his nose from the pillow to move with his face to the ceiling. "It has nothing to do with you but you don't have to know everything."

"Oh, having secrets?" Sasuke murmured, running his hand over Gaara's chest to go lower and lower, until the red head stopped it by placing his own hand over it.

"Maybe."

"Why? Don't you trust me?"

"I don't want to go through this with you again. I have nothing to tell you."

Sasuke felt him stiffen a little under his touches, as if they hurt and that only made him more curious. He frowned and took an ofensive stand against Gaara even if he was absolutely sure he wouldn't like that at all.

"Take your shirt off." he demanded, as coldly as he could.

"...What?" Gaara asked huskyly, his eyes narrowing.

"You heard what I said."

Gaara grabbed the hem of his shirt and pulled it up, discarding it next to him with a slight trace of amusement in his eyes. Sasuke glimpsed at that perfectly sculpted abdomen, then moved his hand over the skin, pressing lightly, to see if he would react again and as Gaara seemed more and more amused, he gave up, thinking that it had probably been his eyes playing tricks on him. Everything was okay, except for the fact that he was completely embarrassed.

"Done?"

"Uhm... yeah." he admitted, lowering his eyes. "I think I'm getting paranoid."

"You think?" Gaara rolled his eyes and took his shirt in his hand, ready to get dressed, but Sasuke stopped him by literally throwing himself on the other ninja. "Mmmm... not now." the 'victim' groaned, making Sasuke chase his lips for a kiss and in the end, get nothing. "I'm tired. Besides, we're leaving in two days so you'd better enjoy your free time while you still can."

"When did you talk to the Leader?"

"Yesterday." Gaara replied after a few moments, giving up under Sasuke, who kept claiming every part of his partner's body for himself. "Don't..."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"I was going to tell you **later**, now get off me! I'm not..." he choked with a moan and his body simply refused to resist any more, remaining still on the matress, under the dark-haired ninja who really enjoyed torturing Gaara like that for not telling him everything.

"What's wrong?" he asked, crawling back to reach his mouth and claim it in a kiss. "If everything was okay, you would have used your sand against me. You don't want this and still, you let me do whatever I want. This is not like you, Gaara."

"Just shut up. I'm too tired to lecture you right now."

"What have you been doing in the last two hours? You can't be so tired for nothing! Damn it, Gaara, you're the host of a tailed beast! Naruto never got tired in two hours! You seemed to feel okay during the fight between Kay and Itachi. What happened since then?"

"I told you, it's none of your business. And I'm not like your boyfriend from Konoha."

"C'mon, you know he wasn't my boyfriend."

Nothing but an awkward silence followed. Sasuke felt Gaara's steady breathing because his head was resting on his chest, but then... he felt strange, he had a bad feeling, something was wrong and he knew it deep inside. Gaara was hiding something from him and he could do nothing to find out what that was. What could it be? He cuddled up next to him and stretched an arm over Gaara's abdomen as if to make sure he wouldn't go away while he was asleep and then he only needed a few minutes to fall into oblivion and enter the world of dreams.

Gaara stared blankly at the ceiling, feeling his partner's heart beating slowly somewhere near to his own heart. If he wanted to keep him safe he had to make him suffer as well as suffering himself. He was the sacrifice, there was nothing he could do about it anymore, except for pretending that everything was okay. If only shukaku would shut up.

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"Good evening, Kay dear." a lovely voice greeted her as she walked along the corridor to the Leader's office. Kay displayed a polite smile and noded, recognising the person who had spoken to her even if she had her hitae-ate over her eyes again.

"Good evening, Konan-san." she replied, still smiling beautifully inspite of her hidden glare. "Deidara told me Leader-sama wanted to see me."

"Oh, yes, Kay-san. He's waiting for you inside." the blue-haired woman smiled gently, opening the door for her. "Pein, Kay-san is here."

"Thank you, Konan, let her in."

Kay entered and Konan left the room, then the Leader closed 'The Ancient Tome of the Four Elements" and looked at her with sparkling eyes.

"Please, have a seat." he said as he watched her comply with the polite order given to. "How is Itachi?"

"He should be back to normal by the end of the week. Until then I'm afraid he won't be able to get out of bed, but considering the fact that he is a very stubborn person, I suppose he could do it sooner. I can still go on a mission if you want me to, Sir."

"No, Kay, that won't be neccessary. Stay with Itachi for now. I can assign other teams for your missions. What about the young Uchiha?"

"What about him?" she asked, a slight 'what do you care' in her voice.

"I never thought this place was... healthy for him, if you know what I mean. However, his partner seems to blend in perfectly. I hope the two get along well."

"They do, Sir." she replied coldly.

"I'm glad to hear that. Would you like a glass of wine?"

"No... no, thank you." Kay muttered. "_You pervert. I don't know what you're up to, but whatever it is, I don't like it."_ she thought, feeling the scent of white wine in the air.

"That would be all, Kay. You may leave."

"Thank you, Sir."

A few minutes after she left, Konan entered the office through another door and fixed her eyes upon Pein, who had rezumed reading.

"Is it true, Pein?" she asked, rising her eyes to look at the empty chair on the other side of the table as if Kay would have still been there. "Is she another Uchiha?"

"Yes, she is an Uchiha, as well as an Inverse. There are great risks involved when dealing with an Inverse. If you don't mind, I would like you to keep an eye on her. She might not be as loyal to the Akatsuki as she seems and I have no ways of making sure she is bound to this organization. If she should make one single mistake... you will bring her to me immediately. I know she is prone to insubordination and as long as Itachi isn't there to 'temper' her, I'm afraid she cannot be trusted. Therefore, she must be watched closely."

"Of course. The last thing we need is this girl against us. I understand perfectly. But what about the host of the one-tailed beast? Isn't he a threat as well?"

"I have already taken care of that. He won't make any problems. Oh, and if the girl discovers you, kill her. It's not an order. Just do it if you want to."

"As you wish." she smiled.

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Kay entered the empty kitchen and was happy to find some chocolate ice-cream in the freezer to get over her anger. She hated both that man and his partner, Konan. She heard the kitchen door but didn't turn around, recognising the chakra immediately.

"I haven't seen you for ages." she sneered, finally turning around to face Tobi, pushing her hitae-ate up to look at him with her black eyes. "I didn't know you were here as well. What's this, Madara? An Uchiha reunion?"

"Always sarcastic, dear Kay, aren't you? I was coming for that ice-cream but I see you got here first so..."

"Never mind. Let's share, _dear_ Madara."

"How is Itachi?"

"Stubborn." she snapped. "I'll have him back to normal by the end of this week."

"I know he's in good hands. I always thought of you as an Uchiha, you know. One of the best."

"You can keep your ice-cream." she sighed. "I'm going back to the mule to see if he'd like to eat something. Goodbye, Madara. See ya' around."

"Yeah, sure. Bye.""_Are they all trying to get me pissed off today? It started pretty well this morning, without Itachi scolding me for getting up late again and they have to come one by one and be sooooooo annoying. Baaah, fuck 'em! But I know Madara pretty well. I'd be surprised to find out that he really takes orders from somebody, not to mention that that somebody is a very big nuisance called 'Pein in the ass'."_

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Gaara was heading towards the library, wanting to get something to read for that night. Sasuke was already asleep and except for Kay and Itachi, he could feel no other chakras in the building, although he knew Pein hadn't gone anywhere: his chakra was always hidden. Before he could enter the library, a strong hand gripped his wrist and pulled him in the darkness, forcing his body against a wall. He already knew who it was but there was nothing he could do so he let his lips crushed into a brutal kiss and waited for it to end.

"I want you." a soft voice whispered in his ear while his neck was attacked by the same brutal lips that had kissed him so painfully.

"Can't you wait until I come back from that mission?" Gaara snapped, squirming because he felt uncomfortable pinned to the wall with a knee dangerously positioned between his legs to make him unable to escape. "Don't leave marks." he hissed, trying to push his attacker away.

"Don't be so mean, you know it's no use, Gaara. It will only make your situation worst." the ninja continued, pushing his hands under his shirt to caress the burning skin. "I'll be good, as long as you cooperate. And how exactly do you think I could stop myself from leaving marks when you're so damn hot?"

Gaara closed his eyes and tried to ignore both the shukaku, who was yelling as if hell had frozen over and the fuckin' rapist who tainted his body and mind at the same time. It made him sick but he tried not to think about it, he tried not to think about Sasuke and the fact that he was safe as long as he was 'a good boy'. There was no escape.


	11. Chapter 11

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto & Co. **

**Shukaku's words are written in 'bold' and those lines in **_italics_** are Gaara's thoughts. I will type some of their conversations at the beginning of this chapter.**

**Chapter eleven: Interferences**

"**How did it feel to be used for the one you care about? I hope it hurt a lot 'cause you don't seem to have learnt your lesson. I told you to kill the damn nuisance a long time ago, but did you listen? Noooo, you never listen. Love only yourself, fight only for yourself. What happened to that?"**

"_Nothing happened to that. What makes you think I'm not the centre of my universe anymore? Really, don't be stupid. It's just a small change. I included him."_

"**Why? I thought you were a lot more clever than that. I thought I could trust you!" **

"_No matter how bad you fuck up with my mind, my heart belongs to me, and only me. You can't change what's there and I feel like I don't have much control over it myself. Because of that... now I have to fight for both Sasuke and myself. Because I have no control over my feelings for him."_

"**I knew that nuisance would make you lose your mind! Listen to what you're thinking! Look at him! Is he worth risking your life for him? Is it worth suffering for this ungrateful boyfriend of yours? Come on, you've gotta be better than that! Remember that no matter what, we will be together in life and death. Is he worth your sacrifice?!"**

"_That's enough. I will do whatever I can to keep him safe. If can't do that... I will kill him myself."_

Gaara had no privacy and sometimes that could be really annoying, even if shukaku couldn't tell somebody else about his deepest, darkest thoughts, he always found himself craving for silence and the tailed-beast would certainly hear that and would start making such a big fuss about it... at least after some of their big arguments he'd shut up for a while.

"Gaara."

He looked down and saw Sasuke raising an eyebrow at him and his lips moved to let out a small "what?".

"Uhm... nothing." he replied, playing with a stick in the golden fire in front of him. "Just the fact that it's the fifth time I've called your name. Will you get your head out of the clouds and bring it back on earth, where it belongs? We're on a mission. What were you thinking of?"

"Nothing important. Shukaku and I were having a... 'decent' conversation."

"Oh. Well then, sorry to interrupt. I wanted to talk to you... about Pein."

"What about him?" Gaara asked, leaning on the tree behind him with his arms bent under his head.

"I've heard some pretty nasty things about him and I wanted to know if it's true. Some say he's cruel and bloodthirsty, sadistic and a master of torture. You know him better than I do, you're the one who talks to him everytime, so you tell me if it's true."

"How the fuck should I know? You're the one who drank a glass of wine in his presence. You should know better than me."

"Jealous?" he sneered.

"Just stay away from him!" Gaara snapped, glaring at him.

"He doesn't seem that bad, why are you..."

"Shut up and go to sleep."

"**Didn't I tell you?"**

"_You should do the same thing. Leave me alone. This is my problem and I have to deal with it by myself." _

"**It doesn't matter how hard you try to keep Pein away from the boy, 'cause Sasuke will be the one to keep going after him. He's fascinated by the evil aura around this man and he will do everything he can to find out the truth. You're only making things worse by trying to deny him the pleasure of finding out himself what kind of man Pein really is. I told you he's not worth the effort. He should know that every rumor has something true in it, therefore, Pein is a true master of torture. Sasuke only heard that from somebody else, but you have become the living proof. People who make the same mistake twice are either foolish or feeble minded. He must be a big idiot to make the same mistake he made with the snake Orochimaru. Too bad Pein's worse than Orochimaru." **he laughed hysterically, his deep voice making Gaara's head ache. **Think about it, Gaara. First he's going to break you and after that, he'll be going for Sasuke. What will you do then?"**

"_That bastard will have to do his best to break me."_

"**It will be his pleasure to prove you wrong, mine to watch everything through your eyes. It would be funny if Pein actually fell in love with you before getting to Sasuke..."**

"_Don't make me feel sick. This mission makes me feel sick enough."_

"**And I thought you felt sick about going back 'home'. I'm sure Pein misses you already." **

"_Will you shut up?! Stop mentioning that name!"_

"**Okay... if you say so..."**

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Gaara ran a hand through his hair in annoyance. They had been following their target for a while and he wasn't feeling very well. He just wanted to finish the job and go back to the Akatsuki. Sasuke watched the man running on the street to get away from some imaginary assassins, his sharingan fixed upon the victim in a cold, defiant glare. He was a fast learner, he could be bad when he wanted to. The target was unaware that the real assassins where watching him right at that moment, waiting for the perfect time to attack and kept running from nobody in paticular: the street was empty, it was the middle of the night.

The man tripped over something and hit the wet pavement, releasing a long whine as he staggered on his feet trying to stand and continue to run. Gaara's sand gushed out of his gourd and went after the man, engulfing him completely, making nothing more than a ball of sand out of him. Sasuke looked at his partner, his inquiring look getting no answer, just the coldness with which Gaara gazed at the ball of sand. It wasn't like him to ignore the plan and risk like that, but Sasuke didn't complain about it, knowing that he would have the time to do that later. Now he had the feeling that something was wrong.

"Okay you two, turn around slowly, arms in the air and show your faces!" a familiar voice came from behind, making Sasuke remember where they were. "C'mon, we don't have all night!"

The two looked at each other from the corners of their eyes, turning around to glare at their attackers. Of course, the Konoha security was just as good as always. Or maybe not. Sasuke was a bit disappointed to see three genins in front of them, holding kunais, large grins spread on their faces. They reminded him of Naruto, but then he realised that he did know them: the boy between the other two genins was Konohamaru, the other two were his friends. Sasuke felt like his brother for a moment, remembering about his days as a genin, in team 7, thinking of Itachi, until that day come and they had met again. Itachi had felt no interest in paying attention to him then, and he could now see why. Those three were absolutely pathetic. He had probably been the same a long time ago.

"Go away." he growled angrily. "My partner doesn't like children at all, especially children who interrupt him. I doubt that you like to die a very painful death."

"We have no fear! We have the mission to protect Hazuma-san no matter what and we shall do so! Believe it!" Konohamaru grinned.

"Genins assigned for A level missions." Gaara muttered. "Konoha seems to be flying to the winds."

"Maybe they didn't know this 'Hazuma-san' was an Akatsuki target. The same thing happened to me and my team when we were genins. The man we were supposed to protect never told us there were ninjas after him. Things could have ended pretty bad. Let's see, what should we do with them?" Sasuke sneered, his sharingan glowing in the darkness, watching the three shuddering at the deadly tone in his voice.

Gaara turned around suddenly and his sand ball spreaded rapidly, leaving a log behind.

"So, a genjutsu." he said icily, glaring at the three children. "Your sensei might actually be clever."

"Don't you speak like that about our sensei!" Konohamaru yelled.

"You're making too much noise, spoiled little one." the sand ninja told him huskily. In the next moment, the boy's kunai flew through the air and landed at Sasuke's feet. Gaara had an steel grip on Konohamaru's arm, bending it to the point of breaking his bones. Another kunai flew towards Gaara, hitting a sand wall instead, but then somebody managed to hit him hard enough to make him let go of the boy.

Sasuke's eyes narrowed. Konohamaru made a few steps back, holding his arm in his other hand, while the thin silhouette of a kunoichi rose from the ground, emerald eyes piercing his sharingan for a moment.

"Sensei!" the genin girl behind jumped around happily, clapping her hands.

"Uchiha!" the woman snapped in an unrecognisable voice, ready to attack if neccessary. "I never thought I'd ever see your face around here again!"

Sakura had suffered some big change since he had last seen her, both physical and emotional. Her coldness was not fake, it almost made Sasuke smile. He was glad to see that she had become so strong and independent. Gaara growled and raised his arm, the sand following his command immediately, whirling around her threateningly. By the looks in his eyes, he was going to kill her, but then something else came up and another ninja managed to make the sand demon lose control.

"Get away from here." Neji's voice, deepened by time, told her from behind an ANBU mask he got rid of immediately. He had probably become a squadron leader of the ANBU. "I'll fight with these two."

Sakura did as she was told, knowing that it was more important to get the genins to safety than risk her life to fight with two Akatsuki members at the same time. Neji looked at the two and sneered, his pearl eyes resting upon them before getting ready for the Hyuga Gentle Fist fighting style.

"Drop it, Hyuga. They've got better things to do than waste their time playing with you. Don't you two have a mission?" Kay's mocking voice intervened as she walked out of the darkness. "I'll stay here and play with the little Hyuga, you go and finish this job." she ordered with a sneer on her lips.

Sasuke and Gaara looked at each other again, then set out to find their target, hoping that they wouldn't be interrupted AGAIN. Sasuke had time to see that Kay's magekyo was activated.

"Don't even think about going after them, Neji-san. If you try to run away from me, Sakura and the three pretty genins will die. I have my mangekyo ready for them." Kay told him as they circled each other like two tigers getting ready for a battle. "Hazuma was as good as dead from the beginning. By the way..." she continued, watching him move his arms and legs into his usual fighting style "you know your Gentle Fist isn't going to work. You've tried that before."

Neji didn't make the mistake to look in her eyes because he already knew it was the fastest way to hell. He did however, prepare for what he knew would come: he had fought with her before, he knew she was a cold blooded murderess, a demon for which nobody and nothing really mattered, although she could show affection when she wanted to. Thanks to Lee, he had escaped from her last time. He wasn't sure this time was going to be that easy, especially with Sakura and her team trapped in the illusionary world of the mangekyo.


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter twelve: The Nature of Women**

Deidara entered the kitchen and found Kay sitting at the table, eating dark chocolate with her eyes closed. That was nothing unusual for her to do, but what intrigued him was her condition: her chakra was little and unstable. What could she have been doing to end up with so little chakra?

"Hey, un." he smiled. "Are you feelin' okay, yeah?"

"No, yeah." she replied in a cold voice, taking the knife next to her hand to play with it.

"Where have you been, un? Zetsu's been looking for you all morning. He said something about translating some ancient runes, yeah. And Tobi's been looking for you as well. He wanted to talk to you, but he didn't say about what, un."

"Hn." the answer was, as her eyes were watching the knife she balanced on her index, its point painlessly sunk in the tip of her finger.

"Did Pein send you in a mission without Itachi, yeah?"

"No."

"Then where-"

He was cut off by the knife she had thrown right towards his head, but which had fortunately missed him by inches, its blade sinking half into the wall, tiny drops of blood around it, like a small red flower.

"WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?!?" he asked in some kind of sick amusement, staring at it, then at Kay's impassive expression.

"A bug."

Zetsu opened the door and looked at Kay, who merely glared at him. His right eye was glowing on the black half of his body. Deidara shrugged and left without taking the ice-cream he had come for, leaving the two alone in the kitchen. Kay ignored Zetsu and continued to eat her chocolate as the Akatsuki hunter-nin pulled the knife out of the wall. He went to her and thrusted the knife into the wooden table, right next to her hand. She didn't even wink.

"The Leader wants to see you." he told her hoarstly.

"I don't want to see him." she replied, standing. "I have to go to Itachi first. Maybe I'll visit the Leader later."

"He wants to see you **now**."

"I don't want to see him, not now, not ever again, but I will, **later**."

"You know you should be punished for speaking like that and I could punish you right now considering how low your chakra level is."

"Touch me and you'll never see daylight again." she hissed, slamming the door behind her.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Hey, Itachi." she murmured, loud enough for him to hear. "Lie down."

He would have definitly glared at her for using that tone, but he did what she wanted him to, mostly because he knew what was next.

"Had a bad day?" he asked as she removed the black scarf tied over his eyes to finish healing him.

"I'm not so sure. I went after Sasuke and Gaara because, no ofense, but you are the most boring person I've ever known when you're not tearing people apart. I ran into that pesky Hyuga boy again and I would have killed him this time if it hadn't been for Pein's spy to stop me. Damn that Neji Hyuga! First it was his friend, Lee who saved his ass, now that blue-haired bitch Konan."

"Hm, that would be the long alternative for the sentence 'you're in trouble'."

"Thanks for your moral support. Okay, I'm done here. You'll have to wait five more minutes before you can open your eyes and three days before you can use your sharingan. I'm sorry... I'm... not feeling so well." she gasped out, her eyes closing unwillingly, everything going black all of the sudden.

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**Itachi's P.O.V.**

I could have sworn she was going to faint considering how low her chakra level was. She's going to sleep for at least two days until she gets better. Unfortunately, that means I have to sleep in her bed since I don't feel like disturbing her. It's my bed she fainted in.

I'm looking at her from the couch, those five minutes she told me about are long gone and it seems that my sight is back to normal. It was a bit blur at the beggining, but then it became more clear as I looked around at everything. I was surprised to see that everything was in its place, even the parchments. Curious thing, since Kay is like a massive whirlwind and my room would have normally looked like hell. I guess I overestimated her laziness.

She looks as if she were asleep. I'm fascinated by the fact that people's faces are not expressionless while they're asleep, even if they are when they're awake. She has no emotions, no feelings, just bitter cold hatred, no matter how happy or nice she may seem and I'm the only one who knows her true nature. She's smart when it comes for such things. Unlike me, she is able to hide her dark face behind smiles and fake happiness and I cannot deny the fact that she is the best actress I've ever seen. Kay is a cold-blooded criminal, she has never had any remorses until now and I know she's killed many people. The fact that she looks so innocent right now fails, however, to help me forget about her true nature.

Pein is not an idiot, although he acts like one most of the time. He must have figured out that Kay cannot be trusted as long as she is not bound to this organization somehow. Even I'm bound to it. If you can't kill them, join them. That's what I thought then but maybe I was never as smart as my parents thought I was. I still had no choice. I had to keep them away from Sasuke and he might never know how bad it hurt, how angry I was when I found out that the nuisnace I tried to protect from the Akatsuki had abandoned Konoha to be here, amongst enemies. Kay knows I lied to Sasuke to protect him and she has never agreed with this decision. I'm somewhat glad that she is here. She's the only person I've ever trusted and respected.

Kay has always been like this. Loyal to no one, afraid of people to such an extent that she now hates them more than anything else, hiding in her own world, away from those who could hurt her, unfriendly and evil. Despite all these things, I trusted her with my life. I could tell her my secrets, she had no interest in telling them to somebody else mostly because she had no interest in listening to me. I could teach her some taijutsu and maybe even some ninjutsu but she'd always stay with her head in the clouds. I don't know how she became such a fascinating ninja. From what she's been telling me, she started training three years ago because she was tired of doing nothing all day long.

_-Flashback-_

_That day... the day of the massacre. She was there, with her mother, an eleven-year old girl with bloody-red hair and black eyes who spent her time in the swing, sometimes murmuring a lullaby, sometimes looking at the sky or watching me training. I was training that day. I knew they would come, I had been warned several days ago, I had ignored them. I don't know what made me stop training to turn around and look at her. She was swinging in complete silence, in the weirdest position I had ever seen: her back and head were on the board of the swing, one arm on her chest, the other one hanging to the ground, where her fingers played with the soft sand glittering under the swing, her bare feet also hanging, touching the grass. I went to her and stopped, gazing silently at my red-haired sister until she looked back at me with empty eyes._

"_You and your mother have to leave, now." I told her, unable to recognise my own voice. It sounded terribly weak. I didn't want her to go away. "This clan will be massacrated tonight." I couldn't believe I had said that to her. The emptyness in her eyes didn't change, not even for one second, but she did turn her head to look at the sky, ignoring me as if I had only said 'hey, what a nice day, isn't it?' I was just getting ready to leave her alone because she was obviously not worth the effort of getting myself pissed off when I heard her voice: "Does your father know you're not that perfect after all?" she asked bitterly. I knew she hated me and for one moment I could almost see her telling my father that the clan was going to be massacrated just to take revenge. To my great surprise, she only shifted in the swing and stood up under the great oak. "I don't care what happens to this clan. I have no interest in getting my mother away from here since all she's ever wanted was your father's money and I don't give a damn on my life because I was a mistake from the very beginning." she told me. _

_-End of flashback-_

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"She refused to come here and by the way Zetsu described her condition to me, she's probably sleeping now, with no chance of waking up in the next two or three days." Pein smiled to Konan. "I also talked to Itachi, she finished healing his eyes and he will be able to use his sharingan in three days. He refused to tell me anything about his sister. These Uchiha are all the same: stubborn, but incredibly talented ninja. I need to find a way to tame this family trait, especially Kay's. Please, continue to keep an eye on her and try to find out what her weakness is. I will go straight to it and end this silly game once and for all."

Konan nodded and went out of the room, leaving Pein alone with his thoughts, in his armchair. He remembered he missed somebody and stood up, wanting to tell Zetsu to bring the boy, but there was no need to.

"She will never let you near that weakness... if she has one."

"Ah, I was just going to ask somebody to bring you here. I missed you a lot." he sneered, running a hand through the tousled red hair. "You don't happen to know anything about this girl, do you? About her past maybe? Things she likes? Things she dislikes?"

Gaara shook his head but it was more an attempt to get away from Pein's hand than a negative response.

"Touch her chocolate and you might end up pretty bad. That's all I know."

Pein let out a small chuckle.

"Chocolate you say? Interesting, but it's not a weak point, it's more like an... addiction. Find out about her weaknesses for me, will you?"

"No."

"Your attitude is a bit of a disappointment. Why not? And you'd better answer that because I might not be so nice next time you speak to me like this."

"I can be your fuckin' toy but you can't have me as your puppet. I won't spy on her for you. Don't pull too hard at my strings: you might break them." he hissed.

"I am going to break **you** even if it's the last thing I'll ever do!" Pein growled in anger.


	13. Chapter 13

**Sorry for the cliffhanger in this chapter. Promise I'll update quickly.**

**Chapter thirteen: Direction of Revenge**

**Gaara's P.O.V.**

My head hurts like hell and it's a miracle that I didn't fell asleep but my brain feels no longer connected to the rest of my body, although I can still feel the pain. I've been numb until now and unfortunately the numbness is going away... I wonder what takes shukaku so long to heal me. No, wait, my chakra flow isn't working properly because I was so damn messed up by what happened and that's why my wounds didn't heal over the night. I want to get out of bed and have a shower (go back to bed after that of course) but the blanket covering me isn't familiar and the pillow is softer than mine and hell, I remember where I am. I'm still in Pein's private quarters 'cause the damn bastard didn't let me leave and had to cling to me like a disgusting leech all night.

I try to push the blanket away but I stop, pulling it over my head instead. My ears are strained, as well as every muscle in my body, although it hurts too much for me to think about it right now. I hear the door open, then close and... no steps. I realise that I have been keeping my breath all this time and I slowly exhale, careful not to make the smallest noise. It's not Pein but I wouldn't like anyone to see me in here. The next thing I hear is a slight rustle, somebody sits on the couch and waits in a silence that is almost engraving for me. I close my eyes, I don't know why, but this is one of those moments when I wish I were dead. I hear another door open, in the other side of the room. Pein's steps are easy to recognise.

"Kay, what a pleasant surprise. How are you feeling?"

"Better." she muffles a response.

I start slightly when I hear her voice.

"I'm happy you came because we need to talk about some things. I'm sure you know what I mean. Firstly, let's talk about Konan watching you, because I know this made you a bit angry and I need you to understand that you are one of those persons who can never be trusted completely because you don't know when they might backstab you. I'm sure this is not the first time you've heard this and it certainly won't be the last time. I'll be honest to you. I had to make sure you are loyal to the Akatsuki only, therefore, I asked my partner to keep an eye on you. Despite this, I respect you. I just don't want you to betray this organization and flee for nothing, like somebody else once did..."

"Yup, that 'somebody else' happens to be my former sensei, Orochimaru. I should know everything about betraying the Akatsuki, shouldn't I? Oh, Orochimaru also taught me how to lick my tongue! Wanna see?"

I can tell from her tone that she has a sneer on display. Of course she's been Orochimaru's student. Sasuke and I went to Otogakure to find her, how could I ever forget that? We both mistook her for a boy because she was too fast and merciless to be a kunoichi. Ninja girls are usually softer than shinobis (with the exception of my sister, but she's a bit slow too).

"Orochimaru?" he asks, a trace of contempt making his voice quaver, making me feel an evil happiness. "He has taught you well. He's always been a great ninja, after all, he is one of theDensetsu no Sannin, right? Despite this, I can hardly imagine you taking orders from him."

"Oh, I listened carefully to his orders, but I didn't actually follow them. I did things my way and never had any problems. The real problem was that we were both sadistic and we were trying to torture each other by all means. That was a hell of a fun!"

Pein smirks, I can almost see that characteristic smirk of his and I try to chase that image away because it only makes me sick. He likes this girl because she is bold and clever and I'm sure he would never accept the idea of her not being under his command as a member of the Akatsuki and if she hadn't had this fiery personality he would have never accepted the idea of not having her in his bed… Hurray for Kay, who is clever enough not to have 'noble feelings' and get herself into trouble (funny however, that the shukaku also likes Kay in his strange way – hm, Pein and shukaku seem more and more alike... disgusting).

"You might not like my orders, but you still follow them. I must say that I'm impressed."

"I get bored. Missions keep me awake, it has nothing to do with your orders. Itachi's the one who follows orders." she tells him in a bored tone.

"And you follow him."

My heart rebels against me, beating so hard that it almost hurts. I feel her glare upon Pein as she remains silent, a victorious light brightening the Leader's eyes. I was not expecting to hear a low chuckle from her and a cold shiver runs down my spine at the sound of it. It's simply evil, there's no other word to describe it better and for a moment I find myself wondering whether this girl is human or not.

"Look at you, there's so much hope and happiness shining in your eyes. You're like a child who gets a lollipop after a long day of work. Have you never been told that a ninja should not reveal his feelings to anyone? Sorry to disappoint you, Leader-sama. I respect Itachi. There is nothing more that I feel for him, at least until now. You could try again later, I might start looking out for Itachi's well-being..."

Pein must be shocked to hear somebody talk to him like that.

"Well, I think you've already said everything you had in mind, so I should be going now. I would like to rest for a while before you send Itachi and I in a mission."

"I have nothing against that, but before you go to rest" he said, in a normal tone that makes he think he listened carefully to what she said about not revealing feelings "please announce all the members that there will be a meeting tonight, in the library. I want to communicate a very important issue to everybody. Don't worry, they're all here, at the headquarters, I've already taken care of that. Just tell them about the meeting and that I don't want anyone to be late. It starts at 8 p.m."

Hm, he made me curious. I wonder what this is all about and I guess it's something important because as far as I know, there haven't been any meetings like this one in years. Besides, we'd use telepathy and a form of astral projection to communicate and get to the headquarters immediately if we were operating far from here. How come nobody was sent in missions? The more I think about this the more I feel that it's very important. Whatever. Kay and Pein both left and now I have to find away to get out of here without being seen, but I should get dressed first. I'm only in my boxers...

**Normal P.O.V. - 7.50 p.m.**

Sasuke entered the library, followed closely by Deidara, whose mouth was slightly open, probably because of the surprise. The library was lit by elegant candles and at the long table guarded by bookshelves sat the Akatsuki members, talking to each other as if they were children in their first day at school. The ones who were missing were Pein, Konan, Kay, Itachi and Zetsu, but they still had ten minutes to get there.

The leaf ninja finally found his partner at the table and sat in front of him, looking at each Akatsuki member for a few seconds. On the other side of the table, Tobi sat face to face with a chair that was reserved for Konan, next to those two were two other unoccupied seats (certainly for Kay and Itachi who hadn't arrived, although it was already 7.55 p.m.), then the next two were Deidara and Sasori's (Deidara was talking to Tobi while his red headed partner sat silently in deep thought, just as usually) and finally, Gaara and Sasuke. Of course, the seats at the two heads of the table were also unoccupied. One was Pein's and the other (next to Sasuke and Gaara) was Zetsu's. The latter came through the door and went to his place at the table, then two minutes later Kay and Itachi showed up.

"What's taking so long? He made me curious and now he's making me wait." Deidara protested, looking at his partner, who did nothing more than shrug, catching a glimpse of the Leader as he walked in, followed by Konan. Everybody went quiet, watching the man who walked steadily towards his seat. They were all waiting to hear what was so important for such a meeting to be needed. He sat and rustled a few papers, then put them aside and looked at them with tired eyes.

"The very important issue for which I have arranged this meeting is a common complaint of yours, about a problem that I find most disturbing and I shall put it in a shell nut to make this discussion as short as possible: Neji Hyuga."

There was a low rustle across the table as the Akatsuki members fidgeted in their seats.

"Almost all of you have encountered him until now, some may have even been prevented from completing their missions and for some this may have happened several times, so you see, I cannot ignore this problem any longer. My solution is quite simple: we must eliminate him."

Another series of rustles echoed for a few seconds.

"Neji Hyuga is a jonin, ANBU squadron leader from Konoha and he is a member of the Hyuga clan. The Hyuga clan possesses the Byakugan as kekkai genkai and they have mastered a fighting style named Gentle Fist with which they can bring damage to the opponent's charka flow. Neji Hyuga is a fearsome ninja, like most of the Hyugas."

"Couldn't we try to make him join the Akatsuki instead of killing him?" someone chimed in calmly.

Pein's eyes met Sasuke's.

"Interesting point, young Uchiha. We could, indeed, make him one of us, he would be a valuable member."

"No, he wouldn't." Kay snapped, her eyes fixed upon Pein, who glared back at her. "I will kill him as soon as I have the occasion to, even if you make him an Akatsuki member or not. Now if you still want him eliminated I can do the job and I can go alone."

"Tobi doesn't have a partner and the Hyuga is a powerful enemy, imagine what a powerful ally he would prove if he joined us, Kay." Konan told her bitterly.

"I wasn't talking to you." she replied in the same tone. "Neji Hyuga shall die by my hand and if you try to stop me again I'll kill you too this time."

"We should vote." Sasuke suggested again, stopping the only two women in the organization from starting a serious fight.

"Okay, vote we shall, if there is no other way for us to agree peacefully. Let's talk about his actions against us for those who haven't been stopped from completing their objectives by him. Deidara, would you like to start?"

"Yeah! That Hyuga brat stopped me twice: Sasori and I failed one mission and the other was not far from failure as well, un. That was almost three weeks ago, in Kirigakure, yeah. You see, we had to kill this guy and then Hyuga comes up and bang, our mission goes to blazes and the guy escapes, as well as the Hyuga brat, un! The second time he got in our way, Sasori managed to kill the ninja we were after while I fought against the pearl-eyed nuisance, yeah. I wouldn't like this to happen again, so I vote for his death, yeah."

"One of my missions was on razor edge because of him." Tobi continued. "That was two weeks ago, in Amegakure, where I had to kill one of the guys in charge with the politics there. Hyuga alerted the guards and barely had I killed the jerk when they rushed into the room. I could have been caught because of him and I don't like things to be on the edge. I agree with Kay on killing him when I see him again."

"We stumbled into him in Konoha." Sasuke spoke in a low, steady voice, making all the members look at him with a slight trace of respect, all except Itachi, who simply gazed with his black, empty eyes. "Kay took care of him but our mission would have ended with a failure for sure if it hadn't been for her. He used a substitution jutsu to keep us busy and buy some time. Maybe we stumbled into him, but for some reason, I believe he knew we would come. However, killing him would be a great loss. We could try to make him our ally first and if he can't be convinced, he will die."

There was a long moment of silence in which everybody turned their heads towards Pein.

"I suppose these are the premises, now, we have to come up with a conclusion. Should he join us or should he die? Those of you who want him dead raise your hands. And remember that I would like to hear some reasons for your decisions afterwards."


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter fourteen: Six vs. Four **

Sasuke closed his eyes and Pein's voice seemed to come from a very distant world, that's how it sounded in that room that the dark-haired ninja usually liked spending time in and now hated so much for the simple fact that it hosted people who planned other people's death as if they were Gods.

"Tobi, let's hear your reasons for which you think Neji Hyuga should be eliminated and not forced to join the organization."

"It doesn't matter whether we ask him nicely to join the Akatsuki or kill some of his loved ones to persuade him, this guy has no place here and for the simple fact that I would have him as my partner, I want him dead. I'd rather be haunted by his ghost than stand him while he's alive."

"Good point." Kay smirked, letting her hand go down. "I think that Neji is the perfect example of loyalty to his village, unlike us. He will betray us at the crack of dawn without a second thought. If that happens, our secrets will be revealed and there goes every little pretty something we have tried so hard to achieve until now."

"Itachi?" Pein asked, looking at the silent man who lowered his hand once his name was called.

"Hyuga is not like us. Personally, I couldn't fancy seeing him here, at this table, planning assassinations, some of them even against his own blood."

Sasuke glared at his brother, then lowered his eyes. Itachi was right, they were planning assassinations at that very table, against those who might have once been their friends or relatives... and he was doing just the same so why judge the others? He was just like them.

"Sasori." Pein's voice called the red head's name, however, failing to make the sand ninja move more muscles than necessary to speak a few words.

"I don't trust those from Konoha."

"Sasori's right, un!" Deidara spoke before the Leader could even ask him to. "Well, mostly, yeah." he continued, looking at Sasuke and Itachi for one moment. "I'm telling you, that guy is a real nuisance, yeah. I couldn't stand him around here, not to mention cooperate with him, even if I wouldn't be his partner, un. I know Tobi deserves a punishment for being so annoying all the time, but we don't, un. Therefore, down with the Hyuga, yeah!"

Pein seemed to hold back the urge to roll his eyes. He looked over the table and nodded, giving the last member who had raised a hand permission to speak. The plant-ninja fidgeted and let his hand go down with a slight thud, then his white half spoke:

"This time, we both agree. The Hyuga must die, mostly because we're very hungry." His right eye suddenly glowed, while the glow in the other eye faded to opacity. "Yeah, we'll think about him joining the organization after we're done eating him!"

"Okay then." the Leader's eye twitched slightly as he stared at Zetsu. "Now that we've solved this problem, Itachi and Kay's next mission is to eliminate Neji Hyuga."

Kay shook her head.

"Mine." she said possessively.

Pein did roll his eyes this time.

"Fine, yours. Leave in three days or least, otherwise, I will give your mission to somebody else." he hissed. "Any other questions?"

"Is this everything we had to talk about, yeah?" Deidara asked, leaning over the table to have a better view of the Leader.

"Yes. For now. The last thing I wanted to tell you is that we might have meetings like this in time. It seems to be more effective for your teamwork. Thank you for your punctuality, all of you. Especially you, Deidara."

"Thanks, Leader-sama!" Deidara smiled from across the table.

"You may leave now." he said in a low voice, leaving the library with Konan following him closely behind, just as usually.

"Congrats." Sasuke heard Kay's voice whispering in his ear while everybody rushed towards the door to get back to their rooms and normal activities as soon as possible.

"What for?" he asked, in complete amazement.

"Diplomatic interventions."

"Well... thanks. I guess."

"Sorry for your friend."

"Neji wasn't really my friend."

"What makes you think I was talking about the Hyuga?" she sneered, catching up with Itachi and entering their room without giving him a clue about who she was talking.

Itachi sat on the couch with a slight trace of annoyance in his beautiful black eyes, watching Kay as she went to her bead to jump on it and cross her legs like a Turk.

"What do you have against Hyuga?" he asked, taking a cup of cold coffee from the table in front of him.

"I won't let him put a spoke in my wheel again. It's not like me to let someone escape unpunished after pissing me off. By the way, did you know that Pein is not as romantic as he seems when he drinks white wine?" she smiled as he looked at her inquiringly. "Hm, I've gotta change this shirt. I'm going for some training before my good mood goes bye-bye... Close you eyes." she demanded, turning around and watching him over her shoulder.

"I don't want to."

"When have you become such a perverse?" the red-haired girl asked, throwing away the shirt she had worn at the meeting. She was now in a black sports-bra so there was really nothing for Itachi to see, just a perfectly flat stomach, white skin and slender curves. "At least stop staring, will you?" she smiled, pulling a purple jacket over a fishnet shirt. He looked outside, at the heavy rain, then back at Kay, who was playing with a kunai before putting it back in its place.

"By the looks in your eyes, you're not going to train in the training hall." Itachi said.

"Hmmm... no. I used to train in the rain in my first year as Orochimaru's student. It would be nice to remember those times. Guess I'll see you later then. Bye."

The door closed and Itachi looked outside again, listening to the rumbling rain. He liked the rain despite the fact that he couldn't sleep all night because of it, he would wake up instantly at the smallest creak, although there was no reason for him to stay so alert all the time. Kay had just the same tiresome sleep during the night but as soon as the sun started to shine she wouldn't get up no matter what bombs fell upon her.

He put his coffee cup back on the table. It was tasteless, he suddenly hated it for the fact that it kept him awake and he wanted to make it disappear from his sight. Before he could go to the bathroom and empty the cup someone knocked at the door almost shyly, as if whoever was on the other side had suddenly realized that it had been a mistake to do that. He went to open and was ready to send them to blazes (for good) when he saw the very confused face of his younger brother.

"Uh... h-hey." Sasuke stammered out, avoiding his eyes. "I was looking for Kay. Is she here?"

"Out. Training." Itachi muttered, also looking away for some reason he would think about later.

"Out? You mean training hall."

"No, I mean out."

"Okay. Uhm... thanks... I guess."

He walked away steadily and Itachi closed the door, going back for that cup of coffee. If he thought better, he needed some...

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Sasuke stopped in the middle of the training field, ignoring the rain for the first time in five minutes of permanent mental complaining, looking at the girl he had mistaken for a boy not so long ago. It was not hard to make the same mistake again. Kay was already wet, in fact, both Kays were, because it was either Sasuke who was seeing double, or Kay had made herself a clone using some complex jutsu.

She was fighting herself: the same style, the same appearance, the same elegance and apparent wheightlessness, both moving at the same speed, hitting each other just as hard and with the same precision, leaving Sasuke with the impression that she was not in control of her clone... the only problem was to determine which one of the two was the real Kay.

The two jumped backwards simultaneously after hitting each other pretty hard, panting and wiping the water from their eyes as their sharingan burned behind wet, red bangs. One of them turned her head towards Sasuke and the other disappeared with a poof. He went to the real Kay and smiled.

"Hey. Wouldn't it be better for your health if you trained indoors?"

"I'm used to it! What are you doing out here anyway? Shouldn't you be in your room? It's raining in case you haven't noticed."

"I have, but I really wanted to talk to you about something and I went to your room but Itachi told me you were out here, training."

"Talk about what?" she asked, pulling him under a tree.

"Don't kill Neji."

Kay disappeared with a poof again and her voice came from above, so Sasuke rose his head to see her sitting comfortably on a branch, looking at him with a slight trace of interest.

"But... those two were..." he stammered out.

"Yeah. Clones. Why get myself wet when I can ask my clones to do that instead? Besides, it's great for my charka control. I'm not really keen on taijutsu. Now tell me why I shouldn't kill Neji. You said he wasn't your friend."

"I don't know. Wipe out his memory or something but don't kill him. I know I'm a bad excuse for an Akatsuki member... but will you please think over this?"

"Maybe... not. I don't know. Go back to your room, Sasuke. You might find it empty."

"What are you talking about?"

"Just shut up and do it. Geee, how could Kakashi train you when you're such a stubborn kid? You remind me of myself." she sneered, disappearing in a cloud of smoke.

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**Sasuke's P.O.V.**

Okay, this is getting relly weird. Where does Gaara keep disappearing? I can't feel his charka anywhere and he won't tell me anything so I guess I'll have to figure this out on my own. I'm sure Kay knows something. Itachi wouldn't give a damn on my problems anyway so even if he knows he won't tell me anything. I never realized how alike were my dear siblings in some ways...

He's not in the bathroom (I've already checked that twice to make sure I'm not blind or anything...), he was in the room when I left to find Kay, he's not in the library (I've checked there too) and I've just opened the kitchen door. What a surprise, he's not here either. FUCK! Where could that guy be?? I'm so fuckin' pissed off right now! I'm not obsessed or jealous, I just want to know where he is so I wouldn't worry so fuckin much! This IS a criminal organization, isn't it? It's a place full of assassins and you can't really trust anyone! Where the HELL-

"Oh." I say, frowning when I open the door to our room and find him sitting on the window-sill, where he usually sits. "And where have you been this time? I've been looking all over for you."

"On the roof." he replied, without even turning his head to look at me.

I slam the door and go to him, feeling the urge to punch him, but I haven't reached the limits of my composure yet so I try to have a nice talk before bursting out.

"I'm sorry, I don't believe you."

Oops, so much for his composure...

"Believe what you want."

WTF?? Hey, wait a minute. I make a sudden move and his sand immediately immobilizes my arm, his eyes now fixed upon me, giving me a sense of fear. Why am I afraid of him? Hm, it could be because he has never reacted like this before, and I'm not talking about how fast he was or how hard his sand grips at my hand, but what I feel now is not what I would call 'my fear'. Then... I can feel... his fear? Honestly, can Gaara actually be afraid?!

The sand releases my hand after a lot more time than I would have expected, but I don't give up.

"What's that?" I ask patiently.

My hand pushes his head to one side and I can now see the gash on his left cheek. I suddenly realize that I don't want to know anything. It's not my business anyway, it's his secret and if he wants to keep it, then it's just fine with me. I walk away, heading towards my bed, where I bury my face in the pillow and not give a shit on this world anymore. I don't belong here. The only question that survives my massive fury and attept to wipe off everything inside me is... do I belong anywhere in this world?


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter fifteen: Cloud Nine**

**Sasuke's P.O.V.**

By the way she walked in the headquarters this morning, anyone could tell that she was on the point of erupting like a huge volcano and I almost expected her to spit fire at me when I said 'hey' in a sort of innocent tone. In fact, I braced myself for those flames, I knew Kay was angry with me because I had followed her when she went after Neji, but all I got from her this morning was a short, cold 'hey' from her.

I didn't know if she had finished the job, she sent me home the moment she found out I had gone after her, and that happened... hm, I guess not long before she neutralized her target. I think I should wait for her mood to change to ask whether Neji is dead or not, otherwise I'll get my ass kicked pretty bad.

Kay and I (as well as Tobi, Deidara and Zetsu) are in the kitchen. Zetsu's getting ready to eat some raw meat (his usual dish), Deidara and Tobi are eating ice-cream while chatting noisily, I'm looking almost lifelessly at my cheeseburger and on the other side of the table, my sister is playing with the ramen in her bowl, not willing to eat it by the way she stares at it. She's been gone for almost a week.

Normally, when somebody returns from a mission they're really hungry (yeah, that seems to work for my brother as well) and I would have expected her to empty the fridge by now, but she's simply lying in her chair and plays with the food instead of eating it.

"How did it go? If you're too tired to report to Pein, tell me and I'll tell him." Zetsu said roughly.

"Hn." she replied icily.

"Did you kill Hyuga?"

"Hn."

"Tonight's another meeting in the library. Let everyone else know, did you hear me, Deidara? Miss Hn over here looks too tired to do anything today."

Kay closed her eyes and stood up, striding towards the door and slamming it. Well, at least she didn't blow Zetsu's head off. She's definitely out of sorts. I wonder what happened after I left.

**Normal P.O.V.**

Gaara watched Sasuke from his bed, where he had lain all day, arguing with shukaku by the looks on his face and the deadly glare in his eyes.

"She's back." Sasuke told him, sitting next to him in a brave attempt to make the red head less cold. "The point is that she's not in a good mood and I don't like the idea of asking her what happened. I shouldn't be the one doing it."

"Are you suggesting I should ask her?"

Sasuke shrugged.

"I think we should wait. Zetsu asked her and all she said was 'hn' so I guess asking isn't gonna help much. Actually, I don't really care if Neji's still alive or not, I'm just curious. Something must have happened to make her act like this. She wouldn't even eat and for the Kay I know, that's a big problem."

"We'll find out soon. There's going to be another meeting tonight and I doubt Pein will get over this matter. He's probably going to celebrate the Hyuga's death."

"Hell yeah." Sasuke muttered, his thoughts taking over his mind completely. He only realized that Gaara was staring at him after a minute. "What?" he asked, staring back at his partner, who shrugged in response. "How much time do we have until the meeting?"

"Two hours."

Sasuke lay down next to him, feeling the red head start slightly and then relax forcefully.

"I'm not going to bite you. Can I hold you?" he asked Gaara, who stiffened only for a moment at the sound of the words 'hold you'.

"**Well, Mr. Unbreakable, give the boy an answer... Don't make him wait, he might become suspicious about your reactions... I can already see it in his eyes. Don't give him a good reason to find out everything by himself." **

"_Shut up."_

"Yeah." he told Sasuke, pushing shukaku in some distant corner of his mind to get rid of the low sound of the earth-shaking voice. Before the dark-haired ninja could move, Gaara wrapped his arms around the warm body next to him, pulling Sasuke closer.

"**Run away, run away. Cling to him. Do you really think he will be enough to make you forget about Pein? Admit it, you're starting to break down. He can't feel it, but his touches hurt, just like Pein's, you can't run away from the pain, can you? You have to pretend that everything is fine, you're sitting on cloud nine, the unbreakable god, unreachable in your world of dreams and hate. It's still there, Gaara. Use it like you once did. Like when everything was against you. Use it to break free. Use it to kill them both. You don't need them."**

"_I thought I told you to shut up."_

"**I only want what's best for you. Pein won't kill you, so he's not a threat to me, otherwise I would have been the one to drive you insane not this stupid romance. Your suffering means absolutely nothing to me, I am unreachable as long as you stay cold and keep yourself away from physical harm."**

"_So that's it. You're afraid my wounds will affect you sooner or later."_

"**Actually, I'd be glad if Pein managed to make you lose consciousness. I'd be free to take control."**

"_Dream on. That's not going to happen."_

"**You sound so brave... What makes you think Pein is going to hesitate in doing it sooner or later?"**

"_Oh, I'm sure he wouldn't like the headquarters demolished by a tailed beast. He knows the risks, he's not ready to accept some of them."_

"**He wants Sasuke, right? How can you be sure he won't get close to him when you're not paying attention? The boy started to take courage you know... he can now wonder through the building all by himself without being afraid of what might happen. He knows he's strong, but the poor unfortunate kid is NOT strong enough to take care of himself when Pein's around. What are you going to do if..."**

"_I got the points. Now shut the fuck up."_

"Gaara?" Sasuke's soft voice drove his attention from shukaku. "Do you still... feel something for me?"

"Fuck, not you too."

Sasuke looked at him, frowning in confusion. Gaara shrugged and leaned in to give him a small peck on the lips.

"Stupid questions." he explained patiently. "I had to deal with shukaku's stupid questions all day and now you come and ask a stupid question. Of course I still feel something called love for you, silly."

"**Ha ha ha. Yeah right. You sound so pathetically weak. Open your eyes, Gaara. This little fellow here is not worth the effort, I've already said that to you a thousand times and you still won't listen to me! Are you blind? Look at him! The word 'trouble' is written on his forehead!"**

"_I don't see anything so will you please shut up?" _

"**Oh, now you're starting to say 'please'. What next, you'll say 'PLEASE don't hurt me' to Pein? You know what, you little brat? I've had enough of your sickness! Now you're the merciless demon who kills without a second thought and in the next second you're the world's biggest idiot in love! What the fuck is wrong with you? Do you want me to stop healing you everytime that perverse uses your body as his toy?" **

"_That would be a great idea, but it ends if I die. You know I'm not resistant to severe wounds. One big gash and my blood will flow away. I die, you die. Keep that in mind and LEAVE-ME-ALONE!"_

"What do you think Pein wants to tell us this time?"

"I don't know and I don't care. I don't think I want to come anyway."

"You might not want to come, but you have to. You know Pein's opinion about such things."

"Yeah, yeah. How could I ever forget?"

Sasuke ran his finger over the skin on his lover's cheek. The gash was still there, small, hard to notice, but still there.

"You and shukaku had another one of your big arguments? Is he too upset to heal this? It would only take him about three minutes."

"Well... yeah. That's the answer for both of the questions."

"**Veeeery funny."**

"_I wasn't talking to you."_

"**I'm not upset, I just enjoy seeing you in pain. You must admit that you'd be almost nothing without me." **the beast chuckled.

"_Right. __Almost_ _nothing." _

He heard the beast release a long growl of displeasure and then he could only hear his thoughts, as if the shukaku had disappeared completely, even if he knew that it was still there, listening to every single word. Finally, some peace and quiet, safe in Sasuke's arms. Pein couldn't hurt him while he was there. Pein could hurt neither of them as long as they were together, as long as Gaara suffered for the sake of his partner. That was the only thing he was sure of, the only thing he knew, the only thing that made him keep going no matter what. Fuck shukaku for being so annoyingly stupid every once in a while, fuck Pein for being such a damn perverted tramdriver, fuck the entire world that he hated so much. Full stop.

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Sasuke yawned and sat on his chair at the table in the library, where everybody was waiting for Pein while chatting noisily. Suprisingly, Konan was there, talking to Deidara in what seemed to be friendly terms. Zetsu was also there, he was looking at Tobi with big, hungry eyes, winking gently and barely moving his head to catch glimpses of the others. They just didn't look as tasty as Tobi...

Itachi and Kay were not there, again. Of course, those two always arrived just before Pein. How could they be so close to the limit everytime? While these thoughts poured into his head one after another, the two assassins entered the room, making everyone shut up for a few moments. Kay seemed to have just been awaken by Itachi, her eyes were red and puffy, but she didn't seem to have cried, it wouldn't have been like her at all. She walked weirdly, gracefully, but slightly stiffening at every step, calculating her every move with a precision she only had when she felt threatened. What reasons could she have to feel threatened there?

Behind her, Itachi looked perfectly normal, his sharingan was burning bright red, honouring nobody except Kay with his crimson gaze. He seemed to be watching her closely, even as she sat on the chair, looking down at the wooden table. He sat on the other side, in front of her, and just as he stopped moving, Pein entered the room and took his seat.

"Uhm, yes, well... I'm afraid I had to put off the meeting for some wrong information reasons."

When he spoke the words 'put off', Kay's head hit the table with a thud, followed by a low growl. Everybody else remained silent, staring at the Leader. The awkward silence seemed to last an enternity before someone dared to break it:

"So, what now, un? We can't just go back to our rooms and pretend nothing happened, yeah." Deidara said, looking around. "I suggest we should take advantage of the fact the we are all here and spend the night together, at least for one or two hours, un. I don't think you people have anything better to do, yeah."

"You know something? You're right. You suggest what we should do, Mr. Smarty Pants." Tobi muttered.

"Hmmm... let me think about it, un." he replied, lowering his head in deep thought. Suddenly, a bright sneer appeared on his face and most of the Akatsuki members frowned, as if they knew what bright idea had struck the blondie. "Let's play 7 minutes in Heaven, yeah!" Deidara smiled. "Who's for 7 minutes in Heaven, yeah? Hands up!"

There was another loud thud. Apparently, Kay had risen her head while Deidara was thinking and as soon as she heard '7 minutes in heaven' she let it fall again, mercilessly. A grin bloomed on Deidara's lips as seven hands rose into the air. Sasuke was surprised that one of those seven hands was his. The only ones who didn't agree on playing the game were Itachi, Kay and Gaara. Honestly, he had never thought that the Akatsuki would ever play such a silly game because they had nothing else to do after putting off a meeting for unknown reasons. Besides, the fact that there were only two girls didn't seem to nother them at all.

"So, we have decided, yeah. 7 minutes in Heaven it shall be, un!" Deidara announced, as Konan provided the colored sheets of paper they needed for he game.

"This-is-not-happening." Sasuke heard Kay mutter under her breath, her forehead still connected to the table. That made him conceal a smile.


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter sixteen: Seven Minutes in Hell**

"This is absolutely pathetic." Kay protested lowly when Deidara pushed the mushroom-like hat with the pieces of colored paper under her nose. He grinned and replied in a devilish voice:

"Just pick one, un. It won't bite."

She threw her hand into the hat and took a piece of paper without even looking at it because she was too busy glaring at the table.

"Tan." she growled, holding the piece of paper in the air so that everybody could see it.

Sasuke heard a chair moving and he almost burst out into laughter when he saw that the other tan piece of paper was in Gaara's hand. Deidara thought for a moment. They hadn't decided where the closet would be, so he made a fast choice and opened the door to his room, which was right next to the library.

"In you go, yeah. C'mon, Kay." he told the two, watching the red haired girl as if he was afraid that she'd run away. "Seven minutes... what you do in there is your business, un. Oh, and don't turn on the light, yeah. It might go boom..."

"This sucks." Gaara muttered, closing the door.

Deidara grinned to everybody else who was lucky enough not to end up with a very pissed off Kay in a dark room.

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After closing the door, Gaara remained next to it, trying to get used to the deep darkness. He was also somewhat afraid that he'd walk over a bomb and get blew up by God knew what piece of art of Deidara's. He didn't want to do anything anyway and he knew Kay didn't want that either. Seven long minutes of loneliness, those were the 'seven minutes in Heaven'... blondie was going to get it if he ever came up with such ideas again.

"I've been trained as a sound ninja, by Orochimaru himself. I can hear things normal ninjas can't hear, not even with special jutsus." he heard her voice coming from the other side of the room. Why was she telling him that? "For example, I can hear people's hearts beating in their chests and I can tell if they're afraid or happy. I can hear your heart beating right now, as I am speaking to you, so you see, any other sounds have no importance to my ability to hear the smallest sounds." As she spoke, her voice became more clear, every word being emphasized with great care. But he still couldn't figure out what were her reasons for telling him such things in such a horrible moment. "Imagine what I could hear in a room where you could hear nothing else but complete silence."

His heart jolted painfully, he managed to swallow a thick lump in his throat, but he couldn't speak one word. Now he knew what she was getting at. He did nothing, he couldn't do anything even if he wanted to. He just remained there, waiting for her to break the awkward silence again, which she did.

"Don't trust Pein. Whatever his promises are, don't trust him."

"Why are you telling me these things?" he finally found the energy necessary for him to speak to her.

"Because you don't deserve to go through this all by yourself. I wish there was something I could do, but I can't slit Pein's throat open yet, so I can just... be there for you if you should ever need someone to talk to. And before you ask, no, I won't tell Sasuke. What would be the reason for your struggle if I told him?"

"Hey you two, are you ready to come out now, yeah?" Deidara's voice came through the door.

"Remember what I said about trusting Pein. Maybe him and I are more alike when it comes for being trusted than I thought." she muttered, opening the door to go back at the table and become the offensive, pissed off Kay Gaara knew again.

They all waited for them to go back to their seats before Deidara pushed the hat in front of Konan, rubbing his hands. The blue-haired woman moved her hand inside the hat and took out a piece of paper, staring at it before speaking loud enough for Tobi to wake up from his doze:

"Red!"

"Hn." the answer was. Pein stood up and walked towards Deidara's room, followed by Konan - just the usual sight, nothing special. Deidara collapsed in his chair and played with his hands inside the hat, while watching the others with his big, blue eyes. Sasuke thought that the man was actually very pretty and he wondered how come he didn't have a girlfriend yet. Hm, probably the Akatsuki's fault.

Sasuke looked at the clock. It was 08.21 p.m., so Pein and Konan had six more minutes to 'play'. Well, those two could have been easily declared Couple of the Year. They spent a lot of time together and almost everybody else doubted that they only did it because they were partners...

"So, Kay, how did the mission go, un?" Deidara broke the silence.

"Hn." she glared, then looked in a different direction, running a hand through her long, bloody-red hair.

"Hn means that you killed him or not?"

"Just hn." the girl replied. "Since it's not my turn anymore and I have nothing else to do here, can I leave?" she asked in a cold voice, looking back at the blond.

"No. When Konan comes back, it's your turn, yeah. **Again!**"

"I don't want to play this stupid game for the simple reason that it's stupid!" she retorted violently, making Sasuke jump in surprise at the sound of her voice. Deidara just waved his hand passively and after the silence fell upon the group again, they could hear odd sounds coming from the blond's room.

"Oh, man, they're really having fun..." Tobi chuckled, making Kay sigh in disgust. "Somebody should stop them **now**. The game is called 7 Minutes in Heaven not a few days in bliss. You go, Deidara."

"Why me, un?" the man argued, although he did go towards the door, knocking gently. "Uhm... your seven minutes are up, yeah. You should come out now, un."

There was no reply, so he went back to his seat and after a few more seconds, Konan and Pein came out of the room, the woman's pale skin just recovering from a deep blush. Deidara grinned again, holding the hat in front of Kay, waving his long eyelashes at her. She muttered something like 'I'm gonna stick this into your butt if you make me do it again' and picked one piece of paper, which she slammed on the table, not even looking at her. The blond did and announced happily:

"Who's the lucky guy with a pink piece of paper, yeah?"

He frowned when no one answered or moved, although Kay was already standing, staring at him impatiently.

"Hey, which one of you-"

"Behind you, Deidara." Sasori whispered huskily, still not removing his eyes from an invisible point on the table.

He turned around and saw Itachi watching him inquiringly, tried to smile, and stepped aside, allowing him to walk towards the room. Sasuke had activated his sharingan and he could now see that each of Kay's steps was unstable, weak, she staggered towards Deidara's room and the naked human eye couldn't see that, only the sharingan, and perhaps the byakugan, could catch glimpses of those moves. The door closed behind the two and he deactivated his kekkai genkai with a sigh. He was tired and all he wanted to do now was sleep in Gaara's arms.

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Itachi's sharingan burned in the darkness as he made sure he didn't touch anything that could have exploded, because after all, that was Deidara's room. He didn't want to go any further from the door so he stopped and waited for those seven minutes to end so that he could go back to his room.

"I feel like a jellyfish on the beach." she muttered, sitting on the floor with her back leaned on the door. She brought her knees to her chest and put her arms around them. Itachi went in front of her and also knelt on the floor, listening to the annoying clock ticking somewhere in the room before speaking in a low voice, making sure nobody else could hear but her.

"What happened in Konoha? You're out of sorts ever since you came back."

"A lot of things happened in Konoha." she replied in the same low tone. "Everything went wrong. I couldn't kill Hyuga: firstly because of Naruto Uzumaki, secondly, because of Hinata Hyuga. She stopped me from killing Neji by stabbing me with a poisoned kunai."

Itachi's eyes widened a bit.

"Tell me if I'm wrong." he said. "Because of your kekkai genkai, which makes your blood able to copy all the characteristics of another person, you weakness is related to things that attack you from the inside, that is mostly poisons."

"Correct." she said, her voice quavering. "That's why I seem out of sorts. The poison was messing up my inside and by the time I had found out about it, it was already too late. The Hyuga is alive. He's in the Akatsuki dungeon and Pein is the only one who knows that he's here."

"And the poison? Shouldn't you worry about it?"

"I should, indeed. But I don't worry about things I can't stop from happening, like the days it will take me to recover and the effects of this poison on me."

"Long-term effects?"

"Yeah, some of them. A normal ninja wouldn't have been affected that much but because of my kekkai genkai, things are different for me. I don't know what will happen, as far as I can see, it's not a deadly poison, but it might keep me out of business for a while. I don't want anyone else to know about this."

"Did you heal the wound?"

"I wouldn't have been able to bring the Hyuga otherwise. He's kind of heavy, you know."

"You should have let me come."

She shook her head, a sudden nausea taking over her. Deidara shouted from the other side of the door that their time was over and Itachi helped her get up as she tried not to stagger that much. Kay glared at Deidara.

"This is getting ridiculous." she snapped. "I don't want to play anymore."

"Too bad, un. Three votes against seven don't seem to count that much, yeah. Come on, Konan-san!"

The woman pulled out a green paper from the hat and Zetsu jumped on his feet instantly. Konan started to shudder and looked at Pein:

"Uhm... if I think better, perhaps we should continue this game another time, shall we?" she asked, smiling faintly, all the color drained from her cheeks.

"Yes, of course." the Leader agreed. "We should rest. Tomorrow will be a normal day and some of you will have missions, so you'd better get ready. Deidara, no arguments: you and Sasori will be the first to leave, I have a special mission for you two. Everybody is dismissed. You too, Konan, dear. We can continue what we started later, I have some unfinished business now." he smirked gently.

The woman went out of the library along with the others, Pein remained behind, like a statue, putting a hand on Gaara's shoulder as the red-haired sand ninja was heading towards the exit. Gaara stopped and for a moment he looked after Sasuke to make sure he hadn't noticed anything. He was relieved: Sasuke was too busy talking to Deidara.

As soon as everybody disappeared on their way to their rooms, Pein headed towards his private quarters, followed by Gaara, who was trying desperately to make shukaku stop yelling in his head. Things were bad enough already and they were about to get worse once the door to Pein's room closed behind them.


	17. Chapter 17

** :)**

**Chapter seventeen: To Sink into the Swamp**

"Don't just stand there, have a seat, the couch won't bite." Pein smirked, too busy doing something else at his desk to watch Gaara. The red head did as he was told because he knew that doing otherwise would have certainly changed Pein's apparent good mood. He had never asked him to sit, he only threw him on the bed and got rid of his clothes before the boy could even take a few breaths.

"Would you like some wine?" the Leader asked, finally looking at him. Gaara just lowered his eyes and shook his head, muttering a low 'no, thank you'. Pein shrugged and drank his glass of wine elegantly to the bottom. He wasn't ugly, that was for sure. If it hadn't been for his sadism and evilness he would have been a much more pleasant presence, at least for Gaara. The Leader was young and powerful, a skilled ninja, he had earned respect despite all the horrible things he did most of the time (like what he did to Gaara), he had a sharp mind, he could be nice when he wanted to and he was also very beautiful when not violent in his actions, or at least, that was what Gaara thought, because behind the violence with which he raped him every time, his skin was soft, his lips were warm and caressing, his moves more elegant than anything he had ever seen. He was like a panther. Elegant, noble, mysterious, and yet dangerous and awfully strong. One wrong step and it would have torn one apart with its sharp fangs and claws. Just like Pein.

"Don't be so stiff." Pein whispered in his ear, making him gasp in surprise, because one moment he had been in front of him and in the next moment he was behind, whispering to him. "Doesn't it hurt to be so strained all the time? Are you afraid of me?"

Gaara didn't answer, he didn't know if he was afraid or not. Sometimes he was and sometimes he wasn't. Pein's cheek brushed against his, making a cold shiver run down his spine. For no reason that he could think of, the red head moved his right arm and ran his fingers through the Leader's flame-like soft hair as the man kissed his neck gently. What the hell was wrong with him? Why was he responding like that to Pein? That could only turn him on and it was one of the things Gaara tried to avoid whenever they were alone.

Strangely though, after a long , passionate kiss, Pein moved away without any explanation, smiling in a way with which Gaara was not used.

"You can go back to your pretty lover tonight." he said in a soft voice, making Gaara wonder if he was really making fun of him. "Don't look at me like a lost puppy, I might reconsider my decision and keep you for myself for the rest of the night considering how sweet you look right now. Goodnight, Gaara."

"Uhm... thank you, Leder-sama. Goodnight." he mumbled, unable to recover himself from the chock of seeing Pein in such a mood. He quickly moved along the corridor to make sure Pein wouldn't change his mind too soon and he would still have enough time to tell Sasuke how much he loved him. Of course, he'd only do that when the boy was asleep.

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"You haven't eaten anything all day. I could get you something to eat, chocolate ice-cream perhaps?"

"Since when are you so kind?" she asked, shaking her head to refuse his suggestion. "Thanks, but I don't think my stomach would like your idea.It hasn't been so keen on food since I made it out of Konoha."

"Maybe you should listen to what Pein said and get some rest."

"Seriously, you worry to much. I'm the one who's supposed to be worried for your attitude. What's up with the kindness and sudden care?Don't worry about me."

"I don't."

She tried to give him a little smile, then looked over the window, at the heavy rain. Perhaps a shower would make her feel better. Kay stood up and went towards the bathroom, almost feeling better already, but when she walked by the couch she felt a sudden pain in her abdomen and another one at the back of her head, as if somebody had just hit her with something really hard.

Before she even knew it, she was half lying on the floor, half lying in Itachi's arms, who had caught her just before she hit the floor. The images of the room and Itachi's voice calling her name faded in less than a few seconds, her mind burying those remnants of counciousness in a deep, white nothing which made her want to cover her inexistent eyes with inexistent hands. She heard her own heart beat once, struggling somewhere in her invisible body, then a second beat echoed in the light, and a third, but she lost the sound as the oblivion absorbed her entirely.

Itachi knew she wasn't dead. Her pulse was almost normal, despite what had just happened. He could recognize the effects of a poison he had studied long ago in the ANBU, and knew that it wasn't deadly. The strange thing about it was that the ninja who used it had to put lots of his chakra to make it work and it affected the victim by feeding with his or her anger and hate. The more hate it absorbed, the more stronger the effects were, ultimately leading to some serious traumas at the brain level. Stupid, slow, but powerful weapon if used wisely. And the greatest part was that Kay had a lot of hate and anger inside her...

"You just had to prove your Uchiha obstinacy." he muttered, carrying her back to her bed.

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"Come in." Pein said, rustling some of the paperwork he hated so damn much.

The door opened and Sasuke came in, sitting on a chair at the man's request. Pein continued with his papers for about a minute, then threw them away and didn't bother look at them anymore.

"I've had enough." he muttered, making the boy smile. "How are you, young Uchiha? I believe the life here isn't what you have expected, am I right?"

"Somewhat, yes." he admitted, lowering his head. "But although I know I'm not as strong as my brother and sister, I am sure I could handle any mission you would give me, Sir."

"You are strong in your own way." the Leader told him. "Would you like something to drink?"

Sasuke smiled again, not very sure why he was ready to try.

"Some white wine, please?"

The man smirked and took out a bottle of the white wine he usually drank, as well as a glass, which he half filled with the sweet-scented potion. Sasuke took the glass he was offered and took a sip, discovering that he really liked the taste of it.

"Leader-sama, I don't mean to be impolite or anything, but there is something I would like to ask you if you don't mind."

"Go ahead." he replied, watching him closely as he took another sip from the glass.

"Kay never told anybody if she did kill Neji Hyuga. I hoped that you could tell me something about that. Actually, I thought of asking her later, considering her current mood, but I couldn't wait any longer. I've been told before that I am a very impatient person."

"And whoever told you that was right. However, you should know that it's not one of sister's ways of doing something to leave a mission incomplete." he said, turning around to face the window.

"So, she did kill him, right?" he asked, jumping on his feet instantly, although he had no reason to do that.

"Yes, I'm afraid she did." he said, looking at him with weird eyes, making him take one step back. There was something creepy about the way he looked at him, he felt watched by the vigilant eyes of a dangerous feline rather than the eyes of a human being. Pein made one step forward, moving slowly towards him, but not letting his eyes go for one moment. It was hypnotizing. Sasuke couldn't break that something that made him unable to look away from him, it was as if a spell had been cast upon him. He only made the same amount of steps back as Pein made forward, and he did it until his back hit the wall and there was nowhere else to go. He tried to think clear, but he couldn't with those eyes fixed upon him. It was like death itself was staring at him from the depths of the underworld.

He could see him coming closer and his body refused to react anymore since he could go backwards. Inevitably, Pein was one step in front of him two seconds later, still keeping him quiet with that stare. But somehow the distance between their eyes still grew smaller, inch by inch, breath by breath, until Sasuke's hand loss contact with his brain and dropped the glass on the floor, the sound of it smashing finally making him snap out of whatever had been wrong with him. Only that it was too late now.

"Move one inch and I'll make sure your lover will suffer even more than you will."

"What? What do you-" he was cut off by a kiss which immediately made him feel sick, but to which he decided not to respond in any way yet. He had to find out what the fuck was going on.

"That's a good boy." Pein whispered, breaking the kiss for a moment. "Is there something unclear to you, Sasuke?"

"You make me sick. You are doing this only because you know I'll never let you put your hands on Gaara. I respected you and now you prove me that I was completely wrong about you. You're nothing more than a perverse slug!"

"I don't care about your opinion about me. Do we have an agreement or do I have to make you understand the situation using the hard way?"

Sasuke bit his lip to blood and shook his head forcefully, closing his eyes tightly to prevent his tears from falling. There he was, the world's biggest loser, hesitating between his fucking dignity and Gaara's safety. How pathetic could he be? Boy, Itachi would pay billions to see him like that for a moment.

"I'll do it!" he snapped, glaring at Pein, whose smile turned into a sneer. "Just stay away from him."

"I knew you would understand. You are a very smart boy, just like your brother."

"I am not like that bastard!" he yelled, squirming against Pein's body. "I am nothing like him! Now do what you want to do and stop fucking with my mind!"

Pein's sudden movent to the lower part of Sasuke's abdomen turned the last word into something that sounded more like a moan. Great, just when things between him and Gaara were starting to get better. What the fuck was in his mind when he'd decided he wanted to join the Akatsuki?!? Now he was willing to let himself be the Leader's toy to protect the one he loved. Why did life had to be such a bitch all the time??!


	18. Chapter 18

**Chapter eighteen: Recollection**

-Flashback-

_Itachi put his backback down in his room and went to the kitchen to get something to eat before going to the backyard to continue his training alone. He stopped when he heard unfamiliar voices coming from the living room where his father was supposed to be at that time of the day. His mother and younger brother had been gone for a few days and they were supposed to be back by the end of the week. _

"_How old is she?" _

_He recognized his father's deep voice. _

"_Seven, by the end of this month." a woman replied. _

_Itachi moved to the door frame and he could now see who was his father speaking to. It was a fiery-haired woman, beautiful and young, dressed in a long, black robe. Fugaku glimpsed at his son and then looked back at the woman. _

"_The girl can stay here, Midori. You can visit her whenever you wish to."_

_The boy found that conversation not very interesting, so he went out of the house, in the backyard, where he could train until it got dark outside and sometimes even until midnight, when he remembered that he had to keep himself alive with some food and water. However, he heard sobs and waited motionless until he knew where they came from. He headed towards that way and stopped six feet away from a small lump he recognized as a human being, a little girl with short, red hair. She must have been the child his father and that woman were talking about. Well then, why was she crying in the backyard? She could have found another place to whimper, a place where she wouldn't have disturbed him. Instead of telling her to go away, he asked her what was her name, in an icy voice he only used when pissed off to the limit – he was annoyed by her whining. The little girl (she looked younger than just seven years old and it was not only because she was small) raised her head, looked at him with wet, puffy eyes, ignored him and continued to cry with her head buried under the red messy hair, her arms embracing two small, wounded knees. She looked more like a boy with her short hair and clothes (she wore a black t-shirt and white pants). _

"_Fine, don't tell me. I wasn't interested anyway." he muttered. "Just... keep it down, okay? I need silence."_

_The red head looked at him again, winked to get rid of the tears that stung her eyes, then she spoke in a small, quavering voice:_

"_Are you a ninja?" _

"_I don't think I look like Rudolph the Rednose Reindeer." he mumbled, glaring at her. _

"_That makes you an even bigger idiot." she snapped all of the sudden, going back to her sobs before he even had the chance to retort. _

"_Fine. I'm an idiot and you are a crybaby. Stop acting like a three-year old. You're very annoying."_

"_Who said idiots like you weren't annoying? Fuck off, ninja boy!"_

"_That was the 'f' word you've just used against me." he murmured, his right eye twitching. "Okay then, listen you little crybaby: I don't care who you are or what the hell you think you're doing in the backyard when I'm supposed to be training, just shut up and don't say that 'f' word again to me or I'll make sure you get your ass black and blue." _

"_I like black." she said in a small voice, looking at him warily. "It's the only color that can make me invisible at night. I wish I were invisible all the time."_

"_Where do you come from? What ninja academy have you been in until now?" he asked, a bit surprised by her state, thinking that she had drawn his attention unwillingly. She liked black because she could simply hide from people when it was dark or because she knew it was very useful color for a ninja to blend with the shadows?_

"_We come from Kirigakure. There's a lot of mist there and I like mist just as much as I like the darkness and the color black. I liked it there, but mom said it would be better if I stayed here, where there's no mist or good places to hide. If I go into the forest anybody who would be looking for me could find me easily. Dead leaves and other... dead vegetation makes a lot of noise and if you move, everything starts rustling around you. Oh, and I've never been to any ninja academy. It's stupid to train so hard and eventually get killed, not that I would mind dying."_

"_Since you talk so much, how about telling me your name, crybaby?" _

"_Ketsueki (a/n japanese for 'blood'). And for one moment only I wish I were a ninja to kick you where the sun won't shine." she frowned, wiping away her tears with the back of her hand. _

"_That's a nice name for a little crybaby who's not brave enough to even try living this life."he told her sharply, ignoring the second part of what she had said. "Whoever gave it to you probably thought you'd be a great ninja one day, that you will fight to survive and nothing less, destroying anyone who'd dare stand in your way. Which clan are you from?" _

"_Inverse!" she replied, keeping an eye on him as he sat on the grass like a Turk, then changing her position so that she was now sitting just like him. He raised an eyebrow and smirked defiantly._

"_So, your name is the exact opposite of what you really are. The blood of two of the most powerful clans in this world is running through your veins and you are a pathetic little nothing who can't even whimper loud enough to annoy somebody and make them willing to do the effort of killing you. I guess too much power can thin to none: you are the living proof. I've heard of your clan before. They've been training women like your mother for generations, women that are able to attract men from other powerful clans. This way, the Inverse clan gets more and more powerful with each newborn, because besides the original kekkai genkai, they also have a secondary kekkai genkai, from their father. I know who you are, sister. Those who have Inverse blood in their veins have been hunted by the Kages for years, brought to extinction."_

"_I'm not guilty for what my mother and clan did, I was told that I was a mistake that should have never been made. They can kill me whenever they want, I'll be ready for them. You tell me if it's worth living a life that was never meant to be mine and die for the stupid decisions others have taken long before I was born."_

"_You're not worthy of your name. Don't expect to ever hear me say it, unless you prove to me that you are strong enough to have it. I'll just call you Kay." _

"_You haven't told me your name yet." she sneered._

"_Itachi (a/n for those who don't know, his name means 'weasel' and for the Japanese, the weasel is an bad omen, signifying bad luck and death :)." he muttered._

"_Well then, Mr. Weasel, I think we have an agreement?" _

"_Yeah, whatever. It's already too late for you to become a big bad ninja." _

_She stuck her tongue at him and started jumping around on the grass, dancing and kicking sticks. Itachi sighed and stood up, ready to start his training after such a tiresome conversation. He couldn't believe his father had been so stupid to fall for that woman. He had known that the girl was somehow related to him from the moment he saw her black eyes. When he had heard her last name, he figured it all out. _

-End of flashback-

Kay frowned and let out a small gasp. Itachi was still watching her, he knew that there were nightmares taunting her, memories of her past, things she had tried to forget and there were a lot of things she had tried to forget. He was the one who knew better, because it was all about him.

There had never been secrets between them. Before the Akatsuki, before the massacre of the Uchiha clan, he had trusted her with his life. Indeed, she had good parts and bad parts (lots of bad parts actually): she was hyper and loud sometimes, she could fall into a deep, dark silence five seconds after laughing the hell out of her, she was the one who'd always disapprove with things he said just for the pleasure of doing it, she was annoying most of the time, but time had brought them closer and Itachi often found himself thinking that he had underestimated her. Behind her happy-go-lucky face, there were two other sides she kept hidden most of the time, especially her shy and sensitive one, which she only showed late at night, when she thought nobody could hear her sobs. The last side was buried in a deadly silence, being the last door which kept her hate and anger locked. She sometimes had thoughts which freaked even him out and the worst thing about it was that she could send those thoughts into anybody's mind, torturing them just to have fun.

During the four years they had spent together at the Uchiha manor, he learned to deal with all these three sides. Actually, it was harder for him to deal with her carefree side than with her dark one and in addition to that, she was happy-go-lucky most of the time. Looking at her face reminded him of those times, of the first time he had seen her, in the backyard, crying. He wondered if she still remembered that day, the day in which she had become Kay. And the days that followed...

Fuck, he needed something to keep him awake. A clock that ticked would have been great because he couldn't even close his eyes with one of those things in his room, making so much noise, but he couldn't go to someone and ask for a ticking clock, that would have been bloody ridiculous, not to mention that Deidara (who was the only one Itachi knew had a ticking monster clock) would have rolled on the floor, laughing. Hmmm... that foolish little brother of his must have had one and Sasuke wouldn't let one word slip out in protest if Itachi glared at him.

He looked at Kay before getting up to leave the room for a damn ticking clock. The girl bit her lip and hissed lowly, then her expression relaxed again. Itachi put his cloak on and left the room silently. It was late, almost 1:30 a.m., but he was certain that even if his little brother was asleep, his partner, the one-tailed beast, wasn't. He knocked at the door and it opened a few seconds later. Gaara didn't show the fact that he was taken aback by Itachi's late visit, he just murmured a low 'hey' and waited for the man to speak.

"Where's Sasuke?" Itachi asked despite the reson for which he had come, but he simply couldn't stop himself from wondering where could his little brother be at that time of the night, because his bed was empty and he couldn't feel his chakra.

Gaara shrugged and replied in a simple voice:

"He's been gone for hours."

"Could I borrow your clock, please?"

The red head raised an eyebrow and a trace of sand brought the noisy object in his hand. He gave it to the dark-haired ninja without asking for any explanation, even if it must have been pretty weird for someone to come at one o'clock in the morning and ask for a clock... Itachi murmured a 'thanks' and went back into his room, where he put the annoying thing on the table. This was going to be a very long night...


	19. Chapter 19

**Sorry: short, hasty and a bit cliffhanged. Whatever. It's midnight...**

**Chapter nineteen: Cold Desert**

"Oi, wake up, we've gotta go, un!"

Sasori opened his eyes, frowned and closed them again, ignoring the annoying blond.

"I'm awake." he muttered.

"Yeah, man, how obvious. C'mon Sasori, I'm not that stupid, un. The pillow was sleeping in your arms as well as you were sleeping with your head on it, yeah. No matter how much I'm glad to see you finally sleep so late in the morning, we've got a mission, un. Remember what Pein said last night, yeah? A special mission, un!"

"Great." the red head mumbled again, looking over the window at the dead leaves falling from the trees. The sun was shining shyly through the uncovered branches of the mighty trees. There was nothing more than another mission ahead of them, Sasori never found new missions so tiresome but now even the thought of it made him want to go back to bed.

"I've already talked to Pein, yeah." the blond continued, brushing his hair for the second time that morning. "You might like this mission, un. We're going after one of your relatives, in Suna, yeah."

"What?" Sasori snapped unexpectedly, making Deidara drop the brush and stare at him in complete amazement.

"I thought you'd be happy to-"

"Who?" his partner cut him off sharply, already done putting his clothes on.

"Your grandmother, Chiyo, yeah."

Deidara watched him as he ran a hand through his red hair, looking away.

"What for?"

The blond shrugged. Sasori pulled his cloak on and sat on a chair, glaring at his partner. Deidara's eye twitched, he sat on the couch and waited for his partner to say something, but all that followed was an awkward silence. He suddenly felt uncomfortable; the red head had been clearly messed up by this new assignment, although he didn't show it.

"Hey, it's okay if you can't do it, I could go and ask Pein to give us something else to do, yeah."

"Or I could turn you into one of my puppets. What makes you think I have a problem with this mission? In fact, I really like the idea of seeing the hag again after such a long time."

"No offense, but your enthusiasm is giving me the creeps, un." Deidara sighed. "Pein told me to bring her back here, but he didn't say anything else. I thought you might know the reasons for which he would want her here, yeah!"

"I don't care." he lied. He actually had a lot of thoughts about what Pein could have wanted Chiyo there and one of them was connected to his cousin, Gaara.

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"We haven't been in any missions lately." Gaara said, putting away the book he was reading to look at Sasuke, who was currently staring expresionlessly at something on the floor. "Get your head down from the clouds, Sasuke."

"Hm? What were you saying? Sorry, I was thinking about something else."

"Yeah, I noticed that. Don't you think it's boring to stay around here all day with nothing to do?"

"You mean no one to kill. Yeah, it's boring. I'd rather be on the other side of the planet right now and I won't change my opinion any time soon. At least you have shukaku to talk to."

"Shut up or I'll kill you just to have some fun."

"You're in a good mood." he smirked. "I'm glad to see you happy at last, even if you're bored beyond imagination. You're right, there's nothing fun around here to do. Nobody to talk to... well, normally, I'd ask Deidara to spar with me or just talk – even about art or dangerous explosives - but he and Sasori left this morning. By the looks on their faces, they won't be back here in just a few days."

"Why don't you talk to your sister? Maybe she's feeling less like an active volcano and you won't get your ass burned by the hot lava she spits when she's angry."

"Good idea. There's just one small detail you've forgotten: I have to see Itachi if I want to talk to her. She's too lazy to open the door at this time of the day and Itachi never leaves the room without a very very good reason. I don't want to see him."

Gaara looked as if he wanted to say something, but he didn't, narrowing his eyes instead. Sasuke knew that look, although he hadn't seen it many times before. His partner was troubled by something, probably important since he didn't bother with small matters.

"By the way... where's my clock? I can't see it anywhere!" Sasuke looked around for it, searching even under his bed for the ticking alarm thing. Hardly had he got up from the floor when a wave of sand hit him and held him firmly against the wall, making his heart jump out of his chest in surprise. "Gaara, what the hell-"

"Shut up." the sand demon's cold voice cut him off angrily.

"What's up with this sudden change of disposition? You're freakin' me out! Let me go."

"Just answer my questions and I'll let you go. If I'm satisfied with your answers, that is."

"It's not funny. It hurts!" his yell only made the sand hold his body even more painfully, but the pain was now nothing compared to Gaara's deadly glare. "What do you want to know? What's so important that you have to crush me like a bug? What did I do?"

"I'm the one asking the questions here."

Sasuke was afraid of what Gaara might have asked; after all, he was neither stupid, nor blind. He looked away, trying to hide his frustration from him.

"It's no use hiding those guilty eyes from me. Where have you been last night?"

Sasuke shook his head.

"Out. I needed some fresh air." he growled. "Now let me go."

"Fuck, don't you lie to me, or I swear I'll forget everything I've been through for you and kill you right here, right now. Now answer that fuckin' question if you don't want me to listen to shukaku. You know what his opinion about you is."

"Where do you think I've been?"

"I know where you've been. I want to hear it from you."

"WELL THEN FIND OUT THAT I ONLY DID IT FOR YOU!" Sasuke yelled, fighting against the sand as much as he could, despite the fact that all he did was make the situation worse, because the grip tightened, making him cough and gasp for air. "I ONLY DID IT BECAUSE YOU'D BE SAFE! HE PROMISSED-"

"And you trusted him."

The sand fell lifelessly on the floor, Gaara turned around and Sasuke couldn't find enough strength to get back on his feet, he could barely even hold back his tears.

"Just like I did."

"What?" Sasuke gasped out. "Do you mean..."

"I'm used to betrayal and broken promises. I'm the one who's guilty because I trusted Pein, although I knew I shouldn't. But..."

Sasuke froze when the sand around him started to move again, he was afraid it would kill him for good this time, but it only danced on the floor, as if the wind blew through it. Gaara pulled him up by the collar and made him look in his eyes, terrifying him.

"Didn't I tell you to stay away from Pein?" His voice was deceptive, both answers, simple as they were, could have been wrong, so Sasuke preferred to nod slightly, unable to stop a tear to run down his cheek, burning his skin. "Why didn't you listen to me?" the red head whispered, wiping the tear away with his cold, soft lips. "You should thank yourself for being the worst liar I've ever seen. Imagine what I could have done to you if I found out later and I were in a bad mood."

"I'm sorry, Gaara." Sasuke cried out at first, but then it became a mere whisper.

"You wanted me first and now I am the one who wants you more. I'm very possessive. You're mine and no one else's. Mine!" he hissed threateningly. "If he touches you again, I'll kill you both."

Gaara let him go and Sasuke slid down to the floor, breathing slowly, afraid to make even the smallest sound. When he finally felt he had the courage he needed to speak, his voice sounded so weak and dry that he couldn't recognize it himself.

"What about you? Aren't you supposed to be mine only?"

"You can't even take care of yourself. You were never made to become an assassin. You're too soft, too precious to be broken by this world. I'll be your shield until you decide to become strong enough to get away from the nightmare you wanted so much to live in."

Sasuke's mind eliminated every single thought at the sound of those harsh words. The echo was strong enough to fill the emptiness. His sharingan activated itself as a response to the sudden outburst of anger inside him, but he said nothing. Words were not enough to express the darkness that was taking over him. He felt alone, abandoned by the person he loved and had tried to protect by sacrificing himself.

He stood up and walked out of the room, striding along the corridor with the sharingan burning vividly in his eyes, his entire being burning in anger and hatred, his mind completely overtaken by darkness. Never made to be an assassin. Never going to be able to surpass Itachi, no matter how hard he tried. Never strong enough to avenge his clan. Never strong enough for anything. What was he good for? Being played with? Never again.


	20. Chapter 20

**I didn't check this chapter for errors due to the lack of time. Sorry. The title doesn't fit either. You can curse me as much as you want. I'm going to bed right now...**

**Chapter twenty: Bitter-sweet**

Sasuke headed towards the exit and bumped into Tobi, hiting him by accident without saying a word. Tobi looked back, watching him as he slammed the door and disappeared in the heavy mist outside.

"Uuuh, Sasuke's being a bad boy... I bet someone'd be interested to hear this..." he sneered behind his orange mask, letting out a hysterical laugh afterwards.

The dark haired ninja heard the laugh and thought Tobi had gone crazy for good, then shook his head and stopped in the middle of the thick fog, making some handsigns to get out of there, to go as far as he could from the Akatsuki. He needed to clear his mind someplace else.

Amegakure seemed the perfect place to do it; besides, it was the closest ninja village and because of the heavy rain, few people were on the streets, most of them running for a shelter. Sasuke was the only one walking calmly along the main street, the bloody sharingan still in his eyes, hidden behind black strands of wet hair. He didn't know what he was looking for, but it was obvious that some peace and quiet alone wouldn't make him feel better.

He wiped the water from his forehead and looked at the clouds battling on the sky above. His sharingan went lower and lower, searching the surroundings for unfortunate people. Because Amekagure was under Pein's command, the ninja village was used as an Akatsuki base and people recognized Akatsuki members easily: most of them never dared to look them in the eyes and immediately changed direction. That was one of the reasons for which Sasuke couldn't find anyone stupid enough to come closer and see what death was like.

However, his luck changed. He felt a presence behind, he smirked to himself and just kept walking normally because the stalker was not a ninja. The man could have been a traveler, unaware that the the red clouds drawn on the black cloak of his next victim were the symbol of the most powerful criminals ever known. Poor unfortunate creature. Normally, Sasuke would have spared his life, but considering how angry he was, breaking that habit was a more pleasant option.

He stopped, the man made a few more steps and stopped as well, the heavy rain apparently preventing them from hearing each other's thoughts: the man's thoughts to rob because there was no other way he could buy himself a bottle of sake and Sasuke's thoughts of playing with the silly human who thought he could get close to a ninja, not to mention rob him...

The thief thought he had moved quickly, but the sneer on his face disappeared as soon as the pain shot through his right arm and he was thrown on the ground, where he found himself whining in pain at the ninja's feet. His heart jolted in horror, he realized that the one who he had tried to rob was a ninja and there was no way he could face one of those demons, especially not this demon, who had blood shining in his eyes.

Shuddering, he crawled away from the dark-haired demon, thinking that he could escape if he didn't make sudden moves, he felt an incredible joy when those terrifying eyes disappeared behind the curtain of rain and his eye twitched when his back hit something that didn't feel like a wall at all. The thief gasped, he rose his head and saw the devilish smirk set upon those pale lips and screamed in terror.

"N-no!! Mercy!" he stammered out, crawling away again, in the opposite direction, until his hands failed him and he collapsed on the wet pavement, gasping for air while gazing deeply into the demon's burning eyes. For a moment he felt so much pain that he couldn't even find his voice to be able to scream. It ended quickly, but luckily, the demon was too busy now to notice him run away.

Sasuke stared at the puddles of cold water, he didn't care if the thief managed to get away, now his only concern was figuring out why his eyes were bleeding and how exactly had he made the man feel that pain without touching him. There had to be one answer for both questions, and the only one he could think about was the mangekyo sharingan. It sounded really stupid, he couldn't have used the mangekyo if he didn't have it, and he was sure he didn't have it because he hadn't killed his best friend yet. Stupid sharingan playing tricks on him.

He wiped away the blood with his sleeve and looked around, his vision still blurred and reddish. The man had managed to get away and he was now alone in the middle of the street, listening to the rain. He felt insecure. His senses were all telling him that something wasn't right and he knew it was best to pay attention to those alarms, because they were always triggered by real dangers. Despite that, nothing was there.

He saw a small black spider crawling effortlessly on his black sleeve and his senses reacted immediately,as well as his mind, with an explosion of thoughts, all screaming the same thing: they were there. He wanted to move but before he could make one single step, he was immobilized by a technique strongly familiar to him: Shadow Imitation Jutsu, used by Shikamaru Nara, the lazy genius of Konoha. Sasuke gasped and tried to struggle –although he knew very well how useless it was. His sharingan could now discern the silhouette a few feet in front of him, among other silhouettes.

"Do we really have to do this?" Sasuke recognized Ino-pig's voice and bit his lip in frustration.

"Shut up, Ino, he's with the Akatsuki now. Besides, he was always a big jerk and we have someone else to rescue. We've talked about this before and I thought we didn't need to go through this again." Kiba stated, with Akamaru barking in approval.

"Yeah, but he's Sasuke! We know him, don't we guys? Can't we make an exception and be gentle, just for once?"

"NO!" Shikamaru and Kiba both yelled at the blonde, making her sigh and be quiet. "And if you don't stop talking about this" Kiba continued "I'll ask Shino to introduce you to his pet spider... it's a very large species." he sneered.

"Ugh... I'd rather eat worms. Wait, no, I wouldn't. Whatever. What are we going to do with Sasuke-kun anyway? I mean, what are **you** going to do, 'cause I'm not going to do anything to Sasuke-kun!"

Sasuke glared and his sharingan met the very familiar byakugan of the silent Hinata. She and Shino Aburame, who was standing right next to her, were the only ones looking at him since the others were too busy arguing. Five of the nine rookies of Konoha were in Ame. What were they all doing there? Anyway, the worst thing was that they had him trapped and he couldn't get away. They were either going to kill him (although he knew he could take advantage of Ino-pig's crush on him if it would be necessary anytime soon) or take him back to Konoha. Either of the two were painful to think about.

"That's enough." Shino growled, stopping the three from continuing their quarrel.

"Where is the Akatsuki hideout?" Hinata asked, stepping forward so that Sasuke could now see her; she had become a very beautiful kunoichi, and she seemed to have changed a lot on the inside as well as on the outside.

"Hmph, like I'd tell you!" Sasuke hissed, looking away.

She pulled out a kunai and the next thing he felt was the cold metal pressing against the skin of his neck.

"Where is my cousin, Neji?" the girl asked again, with the same patience and composure.

"Neji?" the dark-haired ninja asked in confusion. "Wait, do you mean he's not dead?"

"C'mon Uchiha, stop acting like an idiot, that's Naruto's job." Shikamaru muttered. "Man, this mission is already tiresome, don't make it worse!"

"I don't know where he is." Sasuke replied to Hinata, completely ignoring Shikamaru. "I thought he was dead. Someone else from the Akatsuki was sent to kill him and the only one who knows where he is is probably the leader. I don't give a damn anyway, but you can ask the one who was supposed to kill him if you want to."

Hinata looked at the others and nodded slightly, all of them disappearing at the same time in response. Sasuke knew they felt the two charka patterns approaching as well as he did. Curious thing that the shy girl Hinata once used to be now remained behind, alone with an assassin. No wait, she wasn't alone. Fuck, Shikamaru was still there as well, he couldn't leave if he didn't want him to escape from the jutsu and kill them both.

"Where's your partner?" another question followed the sound of the rain as he watched the raindrops wet her black hair, now short and tousled instead of long and sleek.

"Well, if you're still alive, then I suppose he's at the headquarters." he shrugged.

"Uuuuh, tough guy." Shikamaru chuckled. "Wonder who your partner could be. Let's see... he used to be short, silent and deadly, red hair, black-ringed aquamarine eyes, a tattoo above his left eye... hm, wonder who could that be." he smirked, looking at Hinata. "Of course, you two were noted in the Bingo Book, just like the rest of the known Akatsuki members. Naruto will be glad to see you, back in Konoha."

Hinata looked around, her byukugan probably able to see the entire village. Somehow, Shikamaru seemed to read her thoughts because he also looked around, put his arms akimbo and frowned.

"We should leave before they show up. The others can take care of them."

The girl nodded and removed the kunai from Sasuke's neck, but before she could tie him up, Shikamaru was hit by something and thrown into a wall, from where he fell on the street, massaging the back of his neck. Hinata realized that her partner's jutsu had been broken a moment too late, because Sasuke didn't miss the chance to attack her and she was thrown over Shikamaru. Strangely, she didn't say 'I'm so very sorry, Shikamaru-kun!!'...

"Well well well, what do we have here? Hello again, Hinata-san." Sasuke was somehow relieved to hear Kay's mocking voice, but he didn't know how come she knew Hinata. "I know you must be missing your cousin, but coming here was a big mistake. Honestly, I thought you'd be wiser, Nara, but you apparently you haven't learned from the many mistakes you've made until now: intelligence alone isn't enough. Get up, you're pathetic." she snapped, her tone changing to a colder one. "Don't worry for your friends, my partner will take great care of them. As for your cousin, Hinata-san, I can only tell you that he's still alive, although not for long I'm afraid. The Leader has big plans for him."

"No one will die tonight!"

"Oh, no..." Sasuke sighed, slapping his forehead. "It's..."

"The power of youth is on out side!!"

Kay turned around, glaring at the guy with bowl haircut.

"Who the blazes are you?" she hissed, freaking out at the sight of none other that Rock Lee. "Oh my God, what the fuck happened to you? Have you been abducted by martians? Ewww... uhm... well I guess I could kill you without actually touching you or anything... s-stay away... I've had my mind messed up by a certain poison" she glared at Hinata, then looked back at Lee, making sure he wouldn't come any closer "and I don't think you would like to see me acting like a chicken... that'd be embarrassing."

Sasuke raised an eyebrow. Boy, whatever she was talking about, she had definitely had her mind messed up by something... Lee'd better stay away from her. On the other hand, Itachi was there too, which meant that there was a small chance for the rookies of Konoha to get away alive... how did those two knew he was there? Well, at least he hadn't been dragged back to Konoha or anything. Just the thought of seeing Naruto again made him shudder.


	21. Chapter 21

**Chapter 21: Coming to Grips **

"Sasuke, keep that 'youthful' person away from me while I deal with these two over here." Kay smiled. "Oh, there's Itachi too. Hello, Itachi!!" she squealed happily, waving a hand at him. The assassin only glared at her from the roof, where he was burning Shino's bugs with the Great Fireball Jutsu. Sasuke wondered what kind of poison could have done that to Kay and threw some kunais towards Lee, who jumped backwards to dodge the attack just when he was about to use his taijutsu to keep the girl busy and buy some time for Shikamaru and Hinata. "_What the fuck are they all doing here?!?_" Sasuke heard Kay's voice in his mind, reminding him once again that the Akatsuki members used a form of telepathy to communicate undetected.

"_Don't ask me! I didn't call them, that's for sure!_" he replied, flipping backwards to avoid one of Lee's well known kicks. "_Do you think we can beat them?_"

"_Do you think I can kick your ass later for asking this? Of course we can beat 'em, dobe! We're S-class ninjas! We're all in the Bingo Book, you know, and we're not there for watching the clouds in a sunny day!" _Kay replied in an annoyed voice. "Aaargh!! I told you to keep that Martian away from me!!" she yelled, turning around on her tiptoes to kick Lee into a wall but getting knocked down by Ino who had managed to escape Itachi's deadly attacks and come help her partners. The red head used a substitution jutsu to get rid of the blonde and glanced at Itachi, as if she wanted to make sure he was all right. "Sorry, guys" she said, using her hands to do hand signs "but I really don't have time to play now. Mangekyo sharingan!"

Ino was the first to fall into the trap and was sent into the mangekyo world instantly, Hinata was clever enough to look away and Shikamaru also made the mistake to look into Kay's eyes, his body falling next to Hinata, who tried to stand on her feet and help Lee, who was already wounded because Sasuke had shown no mercy. She activated her byakugan and hit the S-class ninja with a powerful Hyuga-style attack, bringing major damage to Sasuke's chakra circulatory system and helping Lee just in time. Hinata had no time to celebrate that, because she couldn't see Kay anywhere and that was a big problem. She knew that the red haired kunoichi was big trouble since Neji's kidnap.

"You!" she heard a familiar voice behind her, turning around to see her cousin glaring at her with his byakugan activated. "You have been in my way for the last time." he hissed threateningly and Hinata realized that it was not Neji, but Kay, using her kekkai genkai to be able to face the Hyuga Gentle Fist style. "I'll take you to your dear cousin."

The blow came a moment later; she barely had enough time to make sure none of her vital organs would be damaged, because the attack had been aimed at her heart. However, there was enough internal damage that would cause severe bleeding, but Hinta couldn't think about that. She had to save her friends; otherwise, the Akatsuki would take care of them forever.

"No more cat and mouse, little girl. You and you cousin are very annoying so I guess this is some family trait. Does the four-tailed demon have it too? We'll be after your sister soon and I want to know what to expect from her."

Hinata forced herself to get up and fight, actually, it was her father's voice yelling at her to do so, but that didn't matter anymore. She was not that shy little girl anymore. She couldn't disappoint anybody, she didn't want to. She caught a glimpse of Shino protecting the unconscious Kiba from Itachi on the roof. It was her job to protect Ino, Shikamaru and Lee. She quickly took out three kunais and threw them towards Kay, trying to buy time, but when she turned around to run she met two crimson eyes and gasped, falling on her knees. Hinata collapsed under the powerful mangekyo sharingan of Sasuke Uchiha.

"Well well well, Sasuke, I'm impressed." Kay smiled, returning to her normal look. "When did you kill your best friend for the mangekyo?" she asked, watching his sharingan return to normal.

"Trust me, I have no idea." he said. "Who's going to help Itachi get rid of those two?"

"You go, I'll stay here and watch over these three. I don't want them to get up and walk home on their feet without saying goodbye."

"Okay." Sasuke said, immediately jumping on the roof where Itachi and Shino were fighting. The older Uchiha didn't say anything when Sasuke showed up and deflected one of Shino's shurikens with two kunais. "That's strange, Aburame, I didn't know you used weapons when you're out of bugs." Sasuke mocked, throwing back the two kunais, which Shino caught easily with one hand. At least neither of his hands were in his pockets anymore. "How about taking dog-boy and flee while I'm still in a good mood? Oh, and you can take the other three with you as well. Unfortunately, Hinata stays with us." he sneered, attacking Shino directly. The leaf ninja moved away but Itachi decided that he didn't have enough patience to let the fight continue and touched one single point on Shino's neck, making him fall on the roof. Sasuke's sharingan saw that he was still breathing. Itachi could have killed him by pressing that point harder, but he was glad his brother hadn't. "What now?" he asked, looking in his older brother's eyes.

"I have an idea." Kay smiled from below. By the way she did it, Sasuke knew it was one of those crazy ideas again...

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Hinata opened her eyes and looked in front of her, at a dark wall she couldn't recognize. She felt horrible, her body ached, she had a splitting headache and her chakra circulatory system was down. Besides, she had no idea where she was. She made great efforts to move and get up, but all she could do was let a small whine escape her throat before somebody helped her get into a more comfortable position.

"Neji-san!" she gasped, smiling happily in spite of the pain and trying to move so that he could hug him, but she stopped herself, remembering that Neji wasn't the boy that would accept a hug, no matter who tried. "Uhm... I'm happy to know that you are all right."

"I'm happy to see you too, Hinata, but I wish it happened somewhere else. We're in the Akatsuki dungeon. What happened?"

Hinata breathed slowly so that her one or two broken ribs wouldn't make it hurt so much every time she inhaled and exhaled. She brushed her palm against her cheek, for the first time thinking that she probably looked awful, and then spoke in a small voice:

"We were sent to find out more about the Akatsuki, in Ame."

"We?"

"Uhm... Shino-san, Kiba-san, Shikamaru-san, Ino-san, Lee-san and I." she added quickly, unable to look in his eyes. "We ran into Sasuke-san..."

"Uchiha."

"Yes... and because he was alone we thought we could take him back to Konoha and persuade him to tell us about the Akatsuki. We were six, it shouldn't have been difficult to do so, we also had an advantage because Shikamaru-san had already trapped him with his Shadow Imitation Jutsu. But then two other members showed up and from what Tsunade-sama told us before we left, they're the strongest in the Akatsuki, after the Leader. I'm talking about Itachi and Kay, the kunoichi who kidnapped you. I know there was a fight, Kay knocked down Shikamaru and Ino with the mangekyo, but I don't remember anything else. I'm sorry, Neji-san."

"It's okay. We'll find a way to get out of here."

"They're after the tailed beasts. Kay mentioned that she will be after the shibi soon."

"You mean she and Itachi will be after your sister, Hanabi?"

"I'm afraid so. I have to warn them about this, but we can't get out of here. My father's idea of infusing the four-tailed beast into my sister to make sure the main branch would have a strong heir was bad. It happened because of me, because I'm not strong enough..."

"You **were** not strong enough, Hinata. That was back then. You know things are different now."

"Yes, Neji-san." she smiled, blushing slightly. "I guess things are a bit different now."

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Sasuke wasn't ready to enter his room, not yet at least. He stared at the door, wondering if he should open it, but he couldn't stop remembering about the fight he had had with Gaara. He sighed, looked down, then turned around to go away, spend the rest of the day in the library and read an interesting book to keep his mind off any problems. His body jolted when he met two aquamarine eyes, but he didn't let any sound escape his throat. There was nothing else to explain: Gaara was either going to accept the truth or reject it forever. Sasuke couldn't believe what Pein had done to them. Now they looked at each other like strangers.

"Your sharingan is bleeding." the red head said in a formal voice, as if he didn't even know him.

Sasuke closed his eyes and wiped away the blood with his sleeve, thinking that it was probably because of his mangekyo. Itachi's mangekyo never bled after he used it, so what was wrong with his? He decided to talk to Kay about that problem later.

"Stop it." he managed to say, shuddering with anger. Gaara's eyes widened a bit.

"Stop what?"

"Don't treat me like this."

"Fine." the sand ninja muttered, entering the room without even looking at him again.

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"Are you proud of him now?" she asked, pouring some water on her face. After running over her cheeks it was pink at first, but then it became deep red because the bleeding wouldn't stop.

"No, I'm not." Itachi replied coldly, looking at her from the doorway.

"What do you mean you're not? He has the mangekyo, isn't that what you wanted from him?" Kay shouted, staring at him with her eyes drowned in tears of blood.

"He's just like you now." he sniffed. "Things couldn't have been worse for him."

"Well then despise me for the rest of my life for what I've done, but don't do this to him, because he doesn't deserve it, you son of a bitch! If your hobby is despising people, then Pein is the one who should receive your immediate attention because he is the one who's been pulling some strings around here to make other people's lives a shit just because you wouldn't let him fuck you!!"

Itachi hissed threateningly at her but she threw him a bloody towel as blood continued to wet her eyes and she continued to speak in the same angry tone:

"The truth hurts sometimes, Itachi. I'm not blind, I saw the way he is looking at you all the time, as if you were something priceless he is constantly being denied to have."

"If they are foolish enough to let themselves controlled by that rapist I don't see the part where that's my problem."

"Bravo, bastard." she smiled faintly. "And all this time I was stupid enough to think that I still have to apologize to you for breaking your stupid, inexistent heart!" the girl screamed, real tears now running down her cheeks. "Well you know what? I don't want to say those words to you anymore! Your precious ears don't deserve to hear such pitiful words. All I can say to you is... that... I hate you. I despise you. I don't love you anymore! You're a waste of time and... feelings." Kay spat, pushing him aside to exit the bathroom because she couldn't stop her sobs anymore.

Itachi watched her slam the door and sighed, looking at the red stained towel in his hands. He knew better, she was a damn good beautiful liar and she still didn't hate him, after being separated for so long. Kay had broken his heart a long time ago, by breaking her promise that she would never stop the Akatsuki from taking him away. She was young and helpless and had acted rashly, nearly getting herself killed by the Akatsuki members. He had trusted her with his life until that moment, but never again after that. He couldn't make the same mistake twice.


	22. Chapter 22

**Chapter 22: Sightseeing**

"Kay?"

She looked at him for a moment, then looked away, at the pink-tainted sunset sky. The only pink she liked was the sky-pink of a sunset. Sasuke wondered if he should bother her with his problems, considering that she looked pretty bothered already. He took a chance and sat next to her, staring at the sky for a few moments, trying to figure out a way to ask the question without sounding stupid.

"Can I... ask you something? Please?" he stammered out lowly, still gazing at the bright colors of the fluffy clouds moving lazily back and forward.

"Sure." she replied patiently.

"I've gained the mangekyo recently and... my eyes bleed after I use it so I was wondering if that's okay. I never saw Itachi's eyes bleed after he uses his mangekyo."

"Yours is not the same. He killed his best friend, you broke your best friend's heart. That's another way to gain the mangekyo, but it's not that powerful and your eyes bleed every time. It's not complete."

"How come you know these things?"

Kay turned her head and gazed at him long enough for him to figure out the answer himself. She was surely not in the mood for talking so he decided not to piss her off with his questions and stood up, wondering where he could spend the rest of the night, because he was determined not to go back to his bedroom.

"Don't waste your time trying to find a way to avoid Gaara as much as possible. Figure out a way to make it up with him. Pein has been planning his death lately."

"What?" Sasuke asked, feeling as if a boulder had feel over his head when he heard her.

"He wants the one-tailed beast and he is going to get it, there is nothing you can do except stay close to Gaara. He knows."

"**WHAT??** And... he didn't tell me?"

"Just go, kid." she said harshly, frowning, but avoiding his eyes.

"Whose heart did you break?"

Kay glared at him this time and Sasuke immediately turned around and walked away without asking anything else. He didn't want to die, not there and definitely not then. How could that bastard even think about planning Gaara's death after all he had done to him?! Pein was much more than just a sick pedophile, he was a monster, a very dangerous one considering that everybody knew how powerful he was. If Sasuke had thought his brother was the most powerful ninja ever, after spending some time with the Akatsuki he knew for sure that his brother was not even half as strong as Pein. No one had ever seen him in a battle, except Konan, who claimed that her partner had never been defeated.

But Sasuke felt like something just didn't add up. Gaara was strong enough for the Akatsuki, even with the power he had from the beast sealed inside him. Would Pein really give up to an assassin like him for the tailed beast? As much as he knew the leader, he would find a way to have both Gaara and the tailed beast, but was that possible? He didn't know who to talk to. It seemed that no one was friendly anymore, although things hadn't been so tensed before. Why now? Why was everybody acting so weirdly? Zetsu hadn't been seen anywhere near the fridge in **three** days, although he was in his room or at the library all the time. Tobi hadn't asked anyone about him being a good boy or anything like that for a while. Deidara and Sasori where the only team gone, which was the strangest thing because there were always two or three teams gone in missions when there were no meetings to attend to. Kay was on the point of destroying everything around her and because her mood was close to Itachi's most of the time, Sasuke knew he didn't want to bump into his brother on his way to his room.

Unfortunately, he could already see death walking steadily across the corridor and he knew there was no turning back. He had nowhere to go and Itachi would have known that his little brother was trying to get away from him. Sasuke tried to act as normal as he could, as if he didn't know anything at all, but the older Uchiha had other plans. He stopped and the boy did the same, looking at him inquiringly.

"Something wrong?" he asked, proud that his voice hadn't quavered at all.

"Hn. How is she?"

"Uhm... boom." Sasuke shrugged, unable to find a better word to describe her mood. Talking to her was like playing with a bomb.

Itachi got the point immediately, he didn't need further explanations to know that she was going to be difficult to talk to. But at least he was sure that she couldn't kill him. Kay was strong, but not that strong, even with her kekkai genkais. Besides, he could trap her in his mangekyo world: she couldn't fight back with her incomplete mangekyo.

"Thanks." he muttered, leaving behind a slightly confused Sasuke. Did his older brother say 'thanks'?!

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"So, I spy with my little eye... something big and... tan."

"A sandbank." Sasori replied hoarsely.

"Okay, you guessed that sandbank too, un." Deidara smirked. "I spy with my little eye... something very bad for my skin, big and blinding and tormenting, yeah."

"The sun." the same hoarse reply came from the red head.

"I spy with my little eye... something ugly and hot and annoyingly deserted."

"That's why it's called 'desert' in the first place." Sasori retorted coldly.

"Hn." his partner grunted. "Well I spy with my little eye something harsh and which keeps getting into my eyes!"

"That would be sand and you can't spy with your little eye something that makes you close both your eyes, dumbass."

"Something gritty and itchy and..." Deidara ignored him.

"Sand."

"Something perverse because it managed to get through my cloak into my boxers, yeah!"

"Let me think... would that be sand again? Shut the fuck up, Deidara. You're not making things any better."

"I'm not the one who managed to get us both lost, un! Why the fuck didn't you take a map?!"

"Useless. The dunes keep moving every day. You'd better pray that we don't come across a sandstorm because **that** would be really bad for your hair."

"I thought there were oases in the desert, yeah!"

"The only 'oasis' in this desert is Suna, so move your ass and stop complaining about everything."

"Why is it a 'oasis' and not a oasis, yeah?"

"Because Suna is not very different from the desert itself."

Deidara couldn't feel his legs anymore. They had been walking for days and the last time they had had water was... a long time ago. Sasori also seemed a bit unfamiliar with those places, despite having grown up there, and that made Deidara feel like shit, because if Sasori couldn't make it in the desert, he had no chance to do it.

"I spy with my little eye something that acts like a cactus most of the time, one with a visible red flower bloomed on the top, un." Deidara muttered, looking around for a rock to blow up.

"I'm not stupid, Deidara. Quit fooling around."

"I didn't say you were stupid, un. Did I say you were stupid, yeah? I don't think I said you were stupid, so I didn't say you were stupid, un! Stop blaming me for everything, will you?"

Sasori turned around and glared at Deidara, who stopped and sneered.

"Let's look for a shelter." he said calmly, to the blond's great surprise.

"Hey, I was talking about you, un." he tried to make his partner react again, but the ninja only used the same calm tone.

"I know, I told you I'm not stupid."

"Fine. If you want a shelter, I could fly and look for one from above."

"You see that sun? If you go higher than where you stand right now, it's going to cook you for dinner. Not that it wouldn't be a great thing to happen, I'm already starved, but I'm afraid that I might end up with an indigestion and without a partner as well."

Deidara looked away, releasing a long, heart-breaking sigh. Sasori growled low in response.

"What about those rocks?" the blond asked, showing him some rocks in the distance.

"It's a mirage." the red head told him coldly.

"Oh, it is? But... it looks so real!"

"That's the point! Come on, we have to move. Suna can't be far from here."

"How do you know?"

"I don't. The wind smells different."

Deidara raised an eyebrow and shook his head, wiping away the sweat on his forehead.

"I can't, Sasori. I can't go any further." he said, staggering on his feet.

"You have to. Otherwise, you will die here."

"I don't care. My life's a shit anyway."

"Nice vocabulary. Now get up." he ordered, watching the man who was on his hands and knees on the burning sand. "Get up, Deidara and don't make me repeat myself again."

"Or else?"

It was Sasori's turn to release a heart-breaking sigh, while he looked at the sky, trying to find a way to make the blond move his ass to safety. Some eagles were just waiting for fresh food, swirling above their heads in the blinding sun. He himself wasn't going to hold on for more to that shit of a life Deidara had mentioned earlier.

"I promise I'll make it up to you as soon as we get to shelter."

"How?"

"I don't want to know. Come on now. Get on your feet. I'm afraid I can't help you with that without falling apart myself."

Curious about what Sasori's idea for 'make it up' was, Deidara managed to get up, grunting in pain. His inside was now screaming for water.

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He watched her lying there, staring at the sky with her black eyes. It was the first time he had ever seen her wearing white and he thought that she looked like a bird whose flight had been brutally stopped. Her arms were outstretched on the roof like broken wings, the soft, light material moving in the gentle breeze like feathers.

"Don't come here, I will get myself killed trying to strangle you." she said faintly, without looking at him.

"I could use the magekyo and then you would have to struggle for 72 hours to get to me and eventually admit your failure. Is that what you want?"

"Go away, Itachi."

The man did the opposite, walking towards her. She didn't move, not even when he sat next to her. Itachi wasn't sure about what he was doing there, he didn't mean to apologize to her, nor to upset her more. For the first time in his life he had followed his heart. He wanted to say something, but she stopped him, whispering a "don't". Ironically, she used to inquire him to speak because he didn't do it most of the time, and now she asked him to hush.

He looked at the light-violet sky, watching the few stars that were shining solitary, spread across the vault of heaven. The air was cold because winter was close and everything would have soon been engulfed by snow. Itachi looked at the girl (who was now a full-grown woman actually), at his partner, at the only being who had accepted him for who he was, for the assassin, the one because of whom the entire Uchiha clan had been slaughtered. Kay sighed in irritation and stood, glaring at him.

"Okay, what do you want?"

"I don't now. Something I lost, perhaps."

She arched a brow and stepped back when he stood, his sharingan piercing her eyes as if wanting to read her thoughts one by one. Kay closed her eyes for a second before she realized that it was a big mistake to do that, especially when he was acting so weirdly.

"Lost?" she asked, looking around for him because he had disappeared, just as she feared he'd do. But he was still there, she could feel his presence, it was tormenting. She felt danger.

"Yes, lost." the dark reply came from behind her.

She breathed slowly before turning around, pursing her lips in frustration. Itachi's lips were slightly curved in a devious smile, she didn't know for sure if he was going to kill her or not. What could he possibly want? Kay stepped back again in an attempt to buy herself some time, but he caught her wrist and pulled her back to her place with one tug. The chilly air was finally getting through her clothes, making her shiver, but that was not the only reason. For the first time in years, she was afraid again.

"What?" she dared to ask, her voice slightly quavering, but only because of the cold. From the early years of her childhood, she had been telling herself that fear was only in her mind. She wasn't going to give in to it after such a long time of keeping it under control.

"Who." he corrected her.

Kay stared at him with her lips slightly parted. She hadn't expected that reply from him, not after their little argument in the room.

"Are you out of your mind?!" she said, almost admitting her defeat. "Have you forgotten those words you told me when they took you away? You can't... not now, after all these years..."

"Have you forgotten those words I told you the day before that?" he asked, perfectly composed, some kind of gentleness now flickering in his crimson eyes.

Her heart jolted, a thousand images flooded her mind, the smell of the pond, the flowers, the summer sky, the taste of cherries, the sound of insects flying around, the feeling of being protected, his hair loose on his shoulders, falling on the skin of her bare arms as he rested his head on her chest, worried eyes meeting her cool ones, butterflies resting on the hand he had placed on her leg, their last kiss and... those whispers. "_My lover, my blood. Mine._" The bitter tears rolling silently down her cheeks, the bitter tears he wiped away with his lips. "_Promise me you won't try to stop them._"

The images changed, she saw blood splattered on the walls of the Uchiha mansion, those people wearing black cloaks with red clouds, those people Itachi had warned her about, tried to keep her away from... but she didn't listen. She couldn't watch and do nothing, they were taking him away after destroying everything he had cared for. She heard Sasuke's sobs and yells coming from inside the house, where he had surprised his older brother saying goodbye to his parents, now cold and deaf to his words. The next thing she heard was her own scream of rage and hatred. The tears taking over her again. His voice... transformed... cold, angry, dark. "_I trusted you. If we should meet again, don't expect me to make the same foolish mistake._"

Kay shook her head violently, chasing the memories away, she didn't want to remember those things. Itachi moved closer and bent forward, whispering gently to her.

"Only five words. Say them."

She couldn't recognize her own voice, it sounded so pathetically weak that she almost expected him not to hear.

"My lover."

He looked into her eyes, searching the black depth, the abyss he liked to get lost in when he was younger.

"My blood." Kay murmured again, unable to hold back a small gasp for the air that seemed to get less with every breath he took away from her as he leaned forward to claim what had been his ever since that day.

"Mine." he said, sealing her lips with a light kiss.


	23. Chapter 23

**Chapter 23: Against the Unwritten Rules**

Sasuke heard the door close and stopped every movement; he even stopped breathing for a few seconds. The silence was so deep that it seemed loud and unpleasant to his ears, he couldn't hear the smallest sound and for the first time in his life, he wished Orochimaru had taught him something about using sounds and vibrations instead of being the worst sensei ever and a pedophile at the same time. He activated his sharingan which immediately penetrated the darkness, allowing him to distinguish the objects in the room without too much effort.

He saw the small lump that was Gaara, sitting on the floor next to his bed, with his knees brought to his chest and arms bent around them in a tight embrace. Sasuke went to him, trying to not to make much noise, but enough for Gaara to become aware of his presence, even if he should have already known he was there because of the shukaku's ability to feel hidden chakra. He held out a hand to touch the sand ninja, however, something made hissing noises and he realized that it was not a snake, but sand. Gaara's sand shield.

"Do I have to say 'please'?" Sasuke asked, pulling his hand back. The soft sand slithered along his skin hesitantly, although Gaara still didn't move. The dark haired ninja sat on the floor and soon felt the sand covering him entirely, like a soft blanket. If he wanted, Gaara was now able to make Sasuke jump over the window, because the sand could control his body even against his will. The sand made him move his hand towards Gaara's and they soon touched, shyly at first, but then their fingers entwined and Sasuke was drawn closer.

"Will you listen to me if I speak?"

"Do I have a choice?" Gaara asked, his voice hoarse and dry.

Sasuke tried to put an order into his thoughts without shivering every time the sand moved over his skin. It was quite distracting, but he didn't want to ask Gaara to stop it and make him angry. How could he talk to him when his mind was so overwhelmed by problems? Their quarrel, Pein, his incomplete mangekyo, all that didn't help, it only made things worse. And still...

"I'm sorry." he sighed. "I know I made a mistake... but I made it because I love you. It's not a heroic speech, but it's all I could think about with your sand under my clothes. Are you doing this on purpose?"

"Of course not, dobe." the sand ninja snapped. "I missed you."

"I expected you to be still angry with me and... WHAT?!"

Sasuke stared at Gaara who was finally looking at him with red, puffy eyes. The sand crept over the sensitive skin of his neck to his cheeks and lips, closing his eyes forcefully and although he didn't like that part, Sasuke didn't fight back, wondering what his partner had in mind.

"Uhm… are you still angry with me?"

"I don't know. Sometimes I feel like giving you all the love I'm capable of and sometimes I want nothing more than to crush you with my sand."

The red head kissed him gently and moved backwards, calling his sand back, which let Sasuke with a feeling of coldness, immediately transferred to his hearts, reinforcing his regrets.

"We should have never come here." he whispered. "Why didn't you tell me Pein wanted the one-tailed beast? You could have told me earlier!"

"What for?" he asked coldly, lying on the floor. "You are already making a big fuss about it. You would have only given me headaches."

"You are so ungrateful." he sighed. "It's hard to believe that you do know that you will die if they remove the beast from your body and you still look like you didn't care. I don't want to lose you for that idiot and those stupid plans of his!"

Gaara looked away, frowning in frustration. Sasuke was only making things worse. When Pein had told him about the fact that he wanted to tailed beast he knew the Leader would make sure he accepted using Sasuke. That man was a monster indeed, but he sure knew how to pull the strings around him to make everything go as he planned. Incredibly, it seemed to work every time.

"_There's always a 'but'_." he thought. "_I'm sure there is something that could be done to turn all this against the Leader. It can't go on like this forever. As far as I know, Deidara and Sasori are after Chiyo, from Suna. They want to use her to revive me after Pein gets the shukaku._"

"**You speak as if I weren't even here."**

"_Shut up. Don't you know the meaning of the word 'privacy'?"_

"**Why don't you tell Sasuke about Chiyo? He'll be glad to know."**

"_Since when do you care? I thought you hated him."_

"**I do. But considering that I won't be here for much longer, I thought being nice wouldn't hurt that much. You know, I think I'm going to miss you, kid." **

"_You'd better not let that stream of good feelings of yours affect me, because I don't need this shit right now. I need something I can use against Pein. Listen, in your opinion, who in this organization could and would help?"_

"**Itachi. And if he won't, because I'm sure he can, you can ask him to give Sasuke's clock back." **

"_Stop foolong around. I'm serious." _

"**Tell me something I don't know. Well, that creepy girl might have a few bright ideas, but I still think you should ask Itachi."**

"_Creepy… oh, you mean Kay.I agree with you, we should talk to Itachi. Kay is a little bit too enthusiastic when it comes for plotting against the Leader."_

"What's he saying now?" Sasuke smiled, waiting patiently for Gaara to wake up from his daydream. "Shukaku." he explained softly when he saw the confused expression on his partner's face.

"Nothing important, just the usual things."

Someone knocked at the door and at first, the two pretended that they weren't there, but as the person outside insisted in that annoying way, Sasuke sighed and went to open the door.

"Leader-sama called us together in the library, in five minutes." Tobi said, emphasizing each word with much care for somebody like him. "No exceptions."

Sasuke felt a slight trace of contempt lingering in his voice as he spoke, he could almost see the sneer hidden behind the orange mask the assassin covered his face with all the time and he couldn't understand his change of attitude. Usually, Tobi was goofy and really annoying, but now he was contemptuous, mocking and cold. Wasn't Zetsu supposed to be the only member with split personality?!

"Okay." he replied, trying to be just as cold and indifferent as he was. "We'll be there."

With that, he closed the door, a bit angry with Tobi for being more annoying than usually and angry about the unexpected meeting. Gaara had heard and he was already on his feet, getting ready to leave. Sasuke growled, he didn't like the situation at all and he had a bad feeling about the meeting, a feeling about which his partner didn't seem to be troubled.

"I don't like this." he said, sounding uneasy, which made Gaara kiss him in response.

"Don't waste your time with worries. Everything will be all right."

"But to remove the beast from your body, some ritual must take place and I doubt Pein is able to do everything all by himself. I won't be able to do anything if asked to." he sighed. "I don't want that sick idiot to take you away from me!"

"Sasuke."

"Hm?"

"Do you trust me?" Gaara asked calmly, looking in his eyes.

"What a stupid question. Of course I do!" he snapped.

"Then don't worry for me. I'll be okay. Let's go. We'd better not be late."

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Deidara groaned in impatience and anger while he tapped the table with his fingers, nearly leaving marks because of the charka he had infused in his hands. Sasori's eye twitched slightly in annoyance, but that was the only result of the meeting Pein had ordered everybody to attend to. The blond's hair hadn't had time to dry completely after the short bath he had been allowed to take and he kept running his fingers through it, tapping the floor with his foot instead. Sasori watched him from the corners of his eyes, knowing that his partner was going to explode as soon as possible, and that the sooner, the better, especially if Pein was there to be blowed up.

"Hey Deidara, Sasori." Sasuke said, sitting on his chair.

"Hey." Sasori also replied in Deidara's place, something which he had never done before, because he didn't even talk for himself when he had to say hello to somebody.

The blond growled unnoticeably, but the intensity of the tappings increased as he concentrated more and more on the moment of his outrage release, in the foreseeable future, with Pein sitting at the other side of the table, talking about uninteresting things. Everybody was there, even Konan, who never came to a meeting before Pein and if she did, it was because he had told her to. Unlike usually, Kay wasn't showing Konan some of her well-known death-glares, sleeping with her head on her arms instead.

Tobi watched the Leader enter the library and everybody stopped talking, everybody stopped making any sounds, except for Deidara who kept tapping in annoyance. Sasuke heard the blond's stomach let out a long, pleading growl which sounded a lot like 'feeeeeeeeed me'. Pein looked at him and his partner, then rustled some papers and sat silently on his chair.

"I'm glad you two arrived earlier than I expected." he said, ignoring the glare he got from Deidara. "I know this is a bit too late for a meeting, and for Sasori and Deidara it must be a torment, so I will try to make this meeting last less than half an hour. Some of you will be leaving very early tomorrow morning, because I want everybody to be here in four days. I am happy to announce you that we are now able to capture and seal the tailed beasts; therefore, we can start taking care of our main goal, starting in four days, with the one-tailed beast, the shukaku."

For a moment, Pein and almost everybody else looked at Gaara, who frowned and glared back at them.

"Don't worry, we shall not lose such a valuable member of this organization, I have a plan to bring him back to life once the sealing ritual is over. That's why I sent Deidara and Sasori to Suna, to get Chiyo, the woman who sealed the shukaku into Gaara at his birth and force her to revive him. Now, to tell you more about this… yes, Deidara?" he asked impatiently when the blond raised his hand and waved it into the air to catch his attention.

"I'm hungry, yeah." he growled. "And very tired."

"Good point." Kay agreed.

"I have nothing against that." Sasuke said, obviously irritated.

"Me neither." Sasori shrugged.

"But the meeting is…"

"Over, Leader-sama." Tobi finished the quick argument, being the first to get up, ready to leave. The others did the same, eventually leaving Pein, Konan and Zetsu alone in the library. Pein sighed, muttered some curses under his breath and also left, slamming the doors behind him as he headed towards his room. Konan stared at Zetsu in disbelief. How dared they defy the Leader of the Akatsuki?!

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Sasori fell on his bed as soon as he reached it, careless about the fact that he was dressed, something he had never done before. Deidara closed the door and yawned loudly, in a duet with his loud stomach, which he would feed later because sleeping was more important. However, instead of going to his bed, he went in the opposite direction and let his body collapse next to his partner's, moving lazily in an attempt to get the latter's cloak off. The red head hissed threateningly at him, but didn't move at all because he found the blond's struggles really amusing.

"What?" he finally decided to ask, helping him with getting rid of the heavy cloak. "Don't tell me you want the second part of my promise because I'm too tired for this right now."

"A promise is a promise." Deidara sneered faintly, removing the red head's shirt.

"You're too tired for this too." Sasori sighed, paying some attention to Deidara's clothes to the blond's delight. "Get off me and don't make me use chakra strings with you again."

"Yeah, right." he chuckled, although he obeyed. "Shit, my body feels like a rock. And it hurts a lot."

"I know the feeling." Sasori whispered in the man's ear, sending shivers through his body to make it feel less like a rock. "But we should be sleeping, both of us. You know Pein's opinion about not having one mission after another."

"Yeah, but lately we've been the only team he sent away, so I guess he can send the others as well."

Sasori noticed that Deidara was so tired that he didn't even finish the sentences with 'un' or 'yeah' anymore. He made him lay back and kissed him on the neck, making the blond moan slightly. The red head knew that in less than five minutes, they were both going to be asleep, so he had nothing to lose if he used some of his remaining energy to make Deidara fall asleep faster. Soon enough, the blond closed his eyes and wrapped his arms around Sasori's neck, pulling him closer to his chest and they both stopped, the puppeteer being the first to fall asleep, to Deidara's great satisfaction.

**Chapter 24: Mission to Final**

Sasuke tossed another stick into the fire he had lit several hours before, using the technique he'd been taught by his father, years ago. It was the second day of their mission and although they could have finished everything earlier, he felt as if he didn't want to return to the headquarters and sacrifice the one who was his partner, his friend, his lover. It was still agonizing to think about that, even if the Leader had explained to them that Gaara was only going to be dead for a few hours, until Chiyo revived him. How could he watch his friend suffer for three days? How could Gaara bear that thought and still look normal?

He stared at the red flames dancing in front of him, apparently inattentive. The man they had to take to the Akatsuki was lying against a tree trunk, tied up carefully by Gaara himself, still unconscious because of his visit in the mankekyo world. Of course, several minutes afterwards, Sasuke's eyes had felt as if on fire, but the pain disappeared in less time than he had thought it would take. His sharingan was now activated and it didn't hurt, unlike the last time he had tried to use it after using the mangekyo.

The prisoner didn't even have to open his eyes to realize that he was tied up well and he had to admit that he was lucky those criminals hadn't tied him against the tree behind him. He looked at the fire, careful not to give the shinobi on the other side any reasons to discover that he was awake. If he remembered well, that shinobi was the one who had used some sort of genjutsu to torture him for hours before he lost consciousness. He'd make sure that didn't happen again. The man searched for the kunai he had hidden somewhere in the folds of his kimono, but a cold voice made him freeze with his eyes closed, trying to pretend that he was still unconscious.

"I believe this is what you're looking for."

A kunai flew past his head and pinned his kimono to the tree, making him shudder and start screaming. The ninja stood, his dark, slender figure frightening him even more; there was something rather inhuman in those crimson eyes, but not as horrible as what he had seen before waking up in that creepy inexistent place.

"I see that my tsukuyomi is not enough to keep you in one place for several hours." he growled, making the man let out a small shout.

"It was not your tsukuyomi, Sasuke." Gaara's voice came from above, as the red haired ninja sat on a branch located only a few metres above the prisoner's head. "We're moving too slow. Is there something wrong?"

"No!" he snapped. "Everything is perfect! Everything is just perfect! Life's never been better!"

"You're acting like a three-year old. Don't make me carry you back to the Akatsuki."

"We could give up, you know. It doesn't have to be this way." he said, glaring at the man, who had managed to get rid of the kunai and was trying to untie the rope. "I haven't forgotten about you for one second. Don't make me lose my patience and torture you to death!"Sasuke hissed, and then looked back at Gaara, whose eyes were shining beautifully in the fire light. "I will not go any faster. You can go ahead if you like, but…"

In the next second he was also sitting on the branch, next to his partner, whispering softly to him.

"You will be in death's arms, not mine."

Gaara's sand warned him about the prisoner who had been lucky enough to untie himself easily and was currently pointing the kunai towards them, scared to death by the two shinobi, but driven by a stronger feeling, by the fear that usually made people act strangely and even stupid.

"This must be some kind of a bad joke." Sasuke sighed. "I'll take care of him."

The man saw the kunai fly away from his hand and it wasn't until he saw blood gushing out of his wound until he felt the pain shooting through his entire arm. He let out a cry of pain and held his wrist while Sasuke wiped the blood that had stained his kunai on the prisoner's neck. The man started to stammer out random words, shuddering as he looked deeper and deeper into those two crimson eyes, those sinister eyes. He could barely hear himself scream as he was captured again in the mangekyo world, where Sasuke was really going to take care of him for the next 72 hours. Yes, take better care of him this time.

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Sasuke heard something and jumped out of bed instantly, in front of the window, where he pulled the curtains to see what was going on. His heart jolted, he had expected the headquarters to be under attack, not Kay throwing snowballs at the window to wake him up. He yawned and opened the window, shivering in the cold winter air as he looked in complete astonishment at the white blanket that covered everything. He saw a snowman next to his sister and wondered how could a cold-blooded killer like her build snowmen and play outside in the snow like the most innocent child.

"Mornin'!" she shouted. "Come outside! Take Gaara with you, I bet he's never seen snow before!"

"Mornin'." he said in a sleepy voice, noticing that she also had dark circles under her eyes. Of course, she and Itachi had been gone in a mission and had returned later than them, at about 3 a.m. that morning. Sasuke looked at the clock, which indicated that it was almost 1 p.m. "Uhm… okay. I'll see if I can convince him."

He looked back inside the room and closed the window, wondering where his partner could have gone. Sasuke called his name and got no reply, so he went into the bathroom and washed his face to wake up and chase the feeling of being like a hibernating bear. When he returned into the room to get dressed, he saw Gaara leaving his gourd next to his bed.

"Mornin'." Sasuke muttered. "Wha'cha'doin' with that?"

"Nothing." the sand ninja replied in a very calm voice. "I'm going outside."

"Wait for me, I'm coming with you."

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Itachi groaned, refusing to believe that it was already morning and that he had to wake up and deal with his splitting headache. He moved his right hand across the pillow and was taken aback to find out that Kay was missing! He could swear she had slept next to him all night, where could she have gone and more important, since when did she get up so early, especially after returning at 3 a.m. from the most annoying mission ever?! He rolled on the bed and threw the sheets away from him, hating their coldness on his skin, as he didn't have a shirt.

Itachi couldn't remember much about last night (half a night actually), he felt as if he were drunk and that remembered him about Kisame, who used to stay awake until late at night to drink another bottle of sake with Kakuzu. He tried to remember if they had done something else except sleeping, but that only made his headache worse, so he gave up and made an effort to reach the bathroom door. It was closed and he knocked first: he knew about his sister's bathing habits, she could stay in the tub for hours, playing with the bubbles. Apparently, she wasn't inside.

"Fuck." he spat. "Where the hell did she put the clock this time?!"

Just when he was about to go back inside the room and rummage in every single drawer for that stupid ticking thing, he heard a noise coming from inside the tub. His sharingan immediately caught a glimpse of a small move and he instinctively reached to grab the kunai and throw it at whatever was there, but he didn't have a kunai because he was only in a pair of shorts. He rolled his eyes (one thing he never did when he was not alone) and went next to the tub, staring at the damn ticking thing: Sasuke's clock, the one he had borrowed to stay awake that night. It had a one of Kay's colored notes stuck on it so he couldn't see what time it was.

His face turned red after he read the note, which said "Good morning, sunshine!" and had an evil face drawn under that line, so he took the note and tossed it into his pocket, his face changing colors again when he saw what time it was: 2 p.m.

"FUCK!" he snapped, hurrying up to get dressed, but stopped when he heard some voices coming from outside.

Itachi pulled the cloak on him so that he wouldn't be cold and catch flu, then opened the window, looking at the three persons in the snow through the branches of a big tree. He recognized Kay and his foolish younger brother having a nice conversation by the looks on their faces and the host of the shukaku next to a tree, watching the scenery. Everything was so silent that he could hear what his siblings were telling each other and it really sounded interesting…

"How come you didn't drag Itachi outside the building? You can be very convincing when you really want to." Sasuke said, making a snowball.

"He was still asleep when I woke up and it's the first time I see him sleep so I let him rest. I guess he really needed it, considering the fact that he didn't even hear me when I moved to get out of bed and… I should have made that clock of yours wake him up, I know he's going to be angry with me for not doing it, but he really looked tired. And I have to admit that he's cute when he's asleep!" she blushed.

Sasuke raised an eyebrow and one corner of his mouth went up in a devious smile.

"Kay… have you been sleeping with him?"

She didn't stop making the snowman and Sasuke waited patiently, because he knew what was going to follow. At the window, Itachi buried his face in the snow on the window-sill, barely stopping himself from jumping over the window and use his mangekyo to torture his little foolish brother for 72 hours. Kay sighed and her eye twitched:

"SASUKE, RUN… YOU'RE GONNA GET KILLED."

"Oh, so you did." he concluded.

"DID NOT." she glared at him.

"You blushed." Sasuke smirked, making her smile and make hand signs before he could do anything to stop her.

Itachi covered his ears in an attempt to spare his hearing from the girl's sound jutsu, which was not as strong as her usual ones. However, it was enough to send Sasuke flying into the air and hit a tree. After he fell on the soft snow, laughing, a small avalanche fell from the branches and landed on him, making him stop laughing because he chocked with snow.

"That's none of your business!" the girl said, blushing even more.

"Hey look, it's Itachi!" Sasuke shouted, pointing blindly towards the window where Kay's bedroom was. She saw her partner and it was her turn to burst out into laughter, making Sasuke stare at her inquiringly. Itachi held the small note she had left for him on the clock so that Kay could read it: "Good morning, sunshine!" The youngest Uchiha froze in panic at the sight of his brother at the window: he must have heard everything. But as Itachi didn't show any sign of irritation, he looked around for Gaara.

Finally, he saw him lying in the snow, under a tree, looking at the gray clouds with his beautiful eyes. Sasuke smiled and went to him, happy that Kay was busy with her snowman and Itachi, whom she tried to hit with snowballs.

"You're going to get wet and catch flu." the dark-haired boy said to his partner, who moved his aquamarine eyes to look at him. "Is it the first time you've ever seen snow?"

"Yeah. It's unbelievably cold, but I like it. It's softer than the sand."

"Not when the wind blows it in your face." Sasuke chuckled. He opened his mouth, but the question stopped in his neck and he bit his lip, hoping Gaara hadn't noticed.

"I'll be fine." the red head replied, still looking at him. "Tomorrow is just another day, nothing more to me."

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. What if something goes wrong? What if Chiyo can't…"

"Stop it. We've talked about this before. Nothing will go wrong. Pretend that nothing will happen tomorrow and don't ruin your day because of me. I need some time alone."

Sasuke nodded and left, but couldn't stop thinking that he should have stayed with him. He felt guilty. He wasn't sure he could take part in the sealing ritual. Three days seemed an eternity to him. The wheight of all those feelings battling inside him was overwhelming. Perhaps he needed to spend some time alone as well.

**Chapter 25: No Steps Forward, Three Steps Back**

"Well done everybody."

Pein's voice was a nightmare, it sounded so fake and pathetic even he could't bear it. He glared silently at the ground, unable to look at anything else, trembling in anger. Well done?! After three days, he felt so tired that he could barely stand on his feet. He didn't want to see Gaara's body; he knew they had left him on the ground, cold, gone, while they were chatting happily as if they had done some great thing.

"Especially you, young Uchiha."

The Leader's voice reached his ears and he pushed away the friendly hand on his shoulder, disgusted. Pein was such a pathetic actor, why didn't he give up once and for all? The Leader didn't give a damn on Gaara's life, Chiyo wasn't there and nobody seemed to notice that his partner was dead, lying there, unable to hear them speaking about him like that. Perhaps it was better for him that way.

"Now, the team assigned to find and bring the two-tailed cat here will leave as soon as possible." he said, surrounded by most of the Akatsuki members.

Sasuke felt a wave of contempt rummaging inside his body and he wasn't able to stop himself from asking, in a terribly cold voice:

"What about my partner? Wasn't Chiyo supposed to revive him after the ritual ended?"

Pein looked down at him and smirked contemptuously:

"Yes, but there is plenty of time to do that. We have more important business now, you know. Don't worry for your partner, he is going to be all right, I promise."

Kay looked at Sasuke and took off her cloak, giving it to Itachi:

"Hold this for me, please."

He took the garment, wondering what she had in mind this time, but then he heard Sasuke's voice and realized.

"I'm sick of your promises."

All the Akatsuki members turned to look at him with big eyes and Pein's lips curved into another annoying fake smile. Sasuke clenched his fists and activated his sharingan to make he could glare at Pein only, but in fact, watch everybody else closely. He didn't care if he was going to die, which was most likely. One small move of the sharingan and he could see Deidara's concealed smile, Sasori's usual indifference, Hidan shaking his head disapprovingly, Pein's face frozen in an expression of satisfaction mixed with loathe.

Everybody had expected him to take his partner and leave, but what Sasuke did surprised them all, even the Leader. He took out a kunai and attacked, running towards the Pein, who could only stare in complete amazement. Kay was more responsive to the boy's attitude: she reached the Leader first and pushed him out of the way, barely having time to make handsigns.

Sasuke saw the huge cloud of smoke surrounding her, but it was too late to stop and raised the arm with the kunai to hit, when something hard sent him flying backwards, into a wall. Pein froze in horror at the sight of the huge snake around Kay, the others let out small noises of surprise as they stared helplessly. The Leader stepped back, with a smirk still on his face. He was happy to see a fight between the Uchihas; it was going to be very interesting, especially because none of them was going to die.

"Get out of the way, Kay." Sasuke hissed. "I have some unfinished business with Pein."

"Not now." she replied. "Stay back or I'll kill you."

"I have nothing to lose." he said, making handsigns incredibly fast. Sasuke looked at the chidori in his hand. A bitter tear rolled on his cheek, as his sharingan burned in hate and anger. "I can turn that smile of yours upside down." the boy snapped at Pein, who woke up from his daydreaming and glared at him.

Kay knew what damage the chidori in Sasuke's hand could inflict her and she made the gigantic snake disappear, concentrating on her remaining chakra instead. She didn't have much chakra left after the ritual and neither did Sasuke, so that was going to be a very short clash. He wasn't ready to deal with the consequences of his actions yet. He needed more time.

Sasuke was trying to find a way to avoid Kay and reach Pein, but he realized that it was imposible because there were other members protecting him as well, like Zetsu for example, who had nothing better to do. The thought of giving up faded when confronted with all his memories of Gaara, with his feelings for him; he looked at his sister and knew exactly where he was going to hit.

Pein saw him coming and was so sure that Kay was going to block the attack completely that he even became amused by the situation. Itachi's sharingan saw everything and analysed each of his little brother's moves. What he saw was far beyond his expectations: the hatred in his eyes, the determination in his every step, the power growing in his hand, everything had changed about him in a matter of minutes.

Deidara covered his ears and let out a small cry of pain at the high pitched sound that filled the underground chamber, shaking the earth beneath their feet. Konan shouted and fell on her knees, losing her balance because of the powerful vibrations. Pein saw the impact between the two: Sasuke still had his chidori, but it was blocked by his sister's sound jutsu and he couldn't get through it. The lightnings hit the floor repeatedly as the chidori became stronger and stronger, to everybody's astonishment.

Konan closed her eyes tightly, trying to cover her ears better and protect herself from those harmful vibrations, but just when she thought she was ready to bear any kind of sounds, all became silent again. She saw Pein standing next to her, shuddering as she had never seen him before, staring ahead. Sasori was, to his partner's great surprise, the first one to dare speak.

"Wow." he muttered. "I've never seen anything like that before."

Itachi looked at his little brother, who lay on the ground, not very far from him, then at his sister, who fell on her hands and knees, out of breath. She moved one of her hands to the right side of her torso, at her ribs and a small stream of blood escaped through the corner of her mouth. Blood soon stained her fishnet, where she held her hand and he knew that his brother's chidori had somehow broken through the sound barrier. She had little chakra left.

He heard Deidara voice his surprise when Sasuke moved and got up slowly, staggering, but still willing to fight. Itachi watched him as he turned around and looked at the Leader, the only person in that place who interested him at the moment. So, his foolish brother was in love with the demon kid. Why didn't he notice before? It all made sense now. Sasuke was acting like that only because he had feelings for his partner and wanted revenge.

"Stay back or I will not bring Chiyo to bring your partner back to life!" Pein threatened, trying to regain his dignity, but Sasuke kept walking slowly towards him. "I am your Leader and you shall obey me! I said stop!"

"I don't care who you are." the dark reply came. "I've had enough."

Something stopped him by gripping his shirt and he was so weak and unstable that he couldn't fight back.

"Let me go, Itachi. Kill me, if that's what you want. I have no reason to live. I will never be strong enough to protect anyone."

"You are pathetic, but I saw something in your eyes today and I felt proud." he whispered. "I wish you didn't waste it on being as foolish as always."

"Let him go, Itachi!" Pein ordered. "Let him come to me if that's what he wants to. I will tell him about the lie he has been living in ever since that day."

Sasuke made a painful move to look at the Leader, who sneered. Itachi tightened his grip on his brother's t-shirt and frowned as his heart changed its normal pace.

"What you know about the massacre of your family is wrong, young Uchiha. It was not your brother who did it."

Kay glared at Pein and met Konan's offensive look.

"We couldn't convince him to join this organization, so we had to force him by other means. Yes, the Akatsuki killed the Uchiha clan that night and we would have killed you as well if it hadn't been for your brother to keep you away."

"That's enough, Leader-sama." a sharp voice interrupted him coldly.

Sasuke didn't even recognize Tobi's voice at first; he was completely different from the crazy Tobi he knew and he would have never thought he'd be the one to dare interrupt the Leader himself. Besides, he still couldn't believe what he had been told.

"How dare you interrupt Pein, Tobi, you crazy monkey?!" Konan snapped all of the sudden, jumping on her feet.

"You've done enough for one day." the Akatsuki member continued, ignoring the woman.

"Don't you dare speak to him like that!!"

"SHUT UP, KONAN, YOU FAT BITCH!!" Tobi yelled at her. "Everybody go back to their business while I have a nice little talk with Pein. Itachi, take care of your siblings and Sasuke, don't worry about Gaara, I'll have Chiyo take care of him. Well what are you all waiting for?" he glared at the other Akatsuki members. "Go!"

Taken aback by the fact that all of the sudden Tobi was the one giving orders, everybody left except the three Uchihas. Kay managed to drag herself next to Gaara's cold body and rolled him over so that he was facing the ceiling. Itachi was still holding Sasuke by the t-shirt when the latter's knees suddenly gave in and he fell on the ground, pulling his inattentive older brother with him.

"Is it true?"

Itachi looked at Kay, but she only lowered her eyes in response. He could almost hear her think 'I told you so'. His eyes went back to his little brother, who just stood there, waiting for an answer. Something sparkled for a moment in the air and fell on Sasuke's hand. A tear.

"Pein's right." the Uchiha prodigy finally said in a low voice.

"Why did you lie to me?" Sasuke asked, turning around to grip his brother by the collar of his cloak. "Hating you was the worst nightmare I've ever been through and I only did it because of a lie?!"

Itachi didn't reply, nor did he push his little brother away. He wanted to see how far he'd go.

"At least I don't have to release myself from that hate. I have another reason to hate you now. You're a liar. You could have told me it wasn't you who did it!!"

"That wouldn't have made things easier. It all happened because of me. It doesn't matter if they did it, it's still my fault. Now get off me."

Unbelievably, Sasuke let him go and after a few more steps, he lost consciousness, falling. Itachi still felt proud of his foolish little brother. He took him in his arms and left the chamber while Kay waited for Chiyo to come and take care of Gaara.

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Sasuke didn't need to open his eyes to know that he was on a hostile territory called 'Leader-sama's private quarters' after a night of punishment for what he had done. He'd remember to thank Kay later for stopping him give Pein what he deserved. He couldn't leave until the Leader gave him permission to and he wasn't there, so Sasuke could only wait until he returned, hoping that he'd be allowed to leave. He was certainly not going to beg.

He rolled in the unfamiliar bed, grunting in pain because of the numerous wounds he had. He wanted to sleep and never wake up again and that thought had been haunting him for a few days, since he entered the Leader's room. The last time he had eaten anything was two days before and he was starting to feel sick and weak, which was exactly how Pein wanted him: unable to fight back.

Sasuke heard the door open and close hastily and he tried, once again, to concentrate at the thought that Pein had to let him go sooner or later; he couldn't keep him in there forever. He heard a pleasant voice calling his name and his body immediately reacted, although painfully.

"Kay!" he heard his own voice, unrecognizable. "What are you doing here? If someone sees you…"

"Shut up!" she snapped. "I've been watching Pein and the others for the last few hours to be able to get here safely and save your ass. Get dressed and go back to your room, lock yourself inside and don't let anyone but Itachi and I in, do you understand? I left you food on the table. Hurry up or I'll dress you myself!"

Sasuke blushed, trying to hide his bruises and wounds from her, but she didn't care. She only moved her fingers over a cmall scratch on his cheek, making him wince at the contact. He saw her making hand signs and when he turned around again, he saw himself smiling at him.

"Well, how do I look?" his clone asked.

"Don't tell me you're going to… you're crazy!" he stated, realizing what her plan was.

"What a discovery!" she sneered. "Just go, Sasuke. I can take care of myself."

"Tell me why you stopped me."

"Now you're the one being crazy. We don't have time for this. If that pervert sees us both here, we're dead, get it? Leave!"

He knew that if he didn't comply, she'd kick him out of the room and that would hurt a lot, so Sasuke finally left, happy that the four walls of that room were not his cage anymore. Luckily, he didn't come across anyone on the corridors, although he did hear voices coming from the kitchen and his heart jolted at the though of being caught. He felt an overwhelming wave of joy pouring through him when he opened the door to his familiar, warm room, the one he shared with his partner ever since their arrival at the Akatsuki.

"Gaara…" he whispered, so faintly that he couldn't even hear himself.

A ray of sunlight managed to get through the curtains and slit the floor in two in the dim light. Sasuke tried to move faster, because he really wanted to see Gaara, but his body objected and he had to stop and catch his breath before making a few more steps to reach his partner's bed. It was the first time he had ever seen him asleep and for a moment he wanted to wake him up, knowing that the shukaku was going to devour his personality. But the shukaku was gone.

Nothing seemed unusual about Gaara, perhaps only his beautiful eyes, which had never stayed closed for so long before. Sasuke wanted to touch him, but he was disgusted with himself and wanted a long, relaxing bath first, hoping that he would be able to dare touch his lover after that. He suddently felt like he wanted to cry and for the first time in so many years, he didn't stop himself from doing it.


	24. Chapter 26

**Chapter 26: Missing**

Sasuke smiled, although he didn't know why. In his view, he was still dreaming, but the feeling was so real and he wanted it so much that he couldn't think clear anymore. Who could think clear in a dream anyway? But when he opened his tired eyes he didn't find any reason for him to believe that it was a dream. He winked gently, contemplating his beauty, his uniqueness, and his gentle features as he inhaled deeply, releasing a sigh when the slender fingers started moving again through his raven hair. It wasn't a dream.

"How are you feeling?" he asked in a weak voice, trying to change the uncomfortable position he had: half sitting on the floor, half sleeping on Gaara's bed.

"Weird." Gaara replied softly, gently placing two fingers on a bruise on Sasuke's left cheek. "I should be the one asking you this question. What have you done this time?"

"I need some time to remember." he mumbled in an innocent tone that made Gaara curve his lips in a little smile. "Are you sure you're all right? You sound a bit different."

"It's quiet." he said. "I'm not used to so much silence."

"Don't tell me you miss him already."

"I don't know."

"I thought he was hard to bear, but it seems that you are really affected. Are you sure you're all right?"

"Yeah, I'll be fine."

Sasuke sighed in relief and let his head on his arms, which were both bent on the mattress, his fingers playing with the sheets. Gaara pulled him up, next to him, where he could hold him in his arms better.

"How did you get rid of Pein this time?"

The raven-haired ninja stiffened slightly at the question, because of the memory of what had happened between them when Gaara found out about Pein and his… actions. He relaxed quickly, noticing the gentleness in his voice.

"Kay." he said. "And one of her stupid, but efficient plans."

"What did you do to make Pein treat you so badly?"

Again, Sasuke remained silent for more than just a few seconds, but Gaara waited patiently, still holding a hand in his lover's soft hair. The boy gulped and closed his eyes, seeing the words inside his mind as he spoke:

"I attacked him."

"Nice." the boy smirked in reply. "You do know that your brother's strength is nothing compared to Pein's, right?"

"Yeah. But… I couldn't just… after you… uhm… after the ritual was over, Pein completely forgot about you… I couldn't bear his arrogance and carelessness anymore. Besides, I found out that it was not Itachi who killed my clan. They did it to convince him to join. I still can't believe it… it seems impossible after all these years in which I must have imagined him dying thousands of times, dying at my feet… and now I found out that I had no reason to hate him. He only tried to protect me. I was stupid, just as usually. Now I have one more reason to become stronger: Pein." he sighed. "I'm going to make that bastard wish he was never born."

"Well, maybe we could train together. Now that my protector is gone, I should work on my taijutsu. Perhaps you could teach me taijutsu and I could help you with your chakra control and stuff like that."

"Good idea. I haven't been able to keep my chakra under control lately and whenever I get angry it bursts out violently, alerting everyone that I am on the edge. It's not very nice to let everyone know that you are preparing to slaughter them…"

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"Sasuke."

He only moaned and embraced the pillow harder, feeling it a bit strange.

"Sasuke!"

This time he opened his eyes unwillingly, letting go of what proved to be Gaara's waist, not a pillow, responding to the call with a small 'yeah?' The red head looked at him and pushed him away gently to get out of the bed. Sasuke soon heard the reson for which he had done that: someone was at the door. The door opened and closed, but he couldn't hear any voices. Didn't assassins say hello to each other like any other normal human beings?

Oh, but the new chakra presence was his brother's and Itachi didn't usually say hello to people. He didn't say anything at all most of the time. Sasuke sat up and looked at the dark silhouette he knew so well, waiting for him to speak first just because he felt too lazy to say a word. Annoyed by the awkward silence, he finally decided to start a decent conversation:

"What?" he asked in an irritated tone that could only make Itachi want to pop his eyes out by strangling him.

"Get dressed." the cold reply came after what seemed to be ages.

"What for?"

"You're coming with me in a mission." he answered, to Sasuke's surprise.

"I'm not your partner. What's up with Kay?"

He could see Itachi's deep glare even with his sleepy eyes, so he did what he had been told, although mumbling random curses under his breath as he looked around for his clothes. Gaara was standing at the window, watching him tiredly and Itachi waited patiently, standing close to the door, ready to leave. What the fuck was that all about?!

"Listen" Sasuke said, as carefully as he could "I'm not going anywhere with you unless you tell me what's going on. Where's Kay?"

"Busy. By the way, blackmail doesn't work on me. Hurry up."

"What kind of mission is it?"

"We have to recover an important document from Yukigakure."

"That's far! Why the hell do you want me to go with you?!"

"Shut up and move."

Sasuke looked at Gaara in frustration, but the red head nodded silently. Whose side was he on? With a sound of annoyance he continued to get ready for the mission that was not supposed to be his. Random ideas went through his mind, all just the same: irrational. Only one persisted, and that was that Kay might have had trouble with Pein after fooling him. If he knew one thing, that was that Pein was not the ninja to accept such pranks easily. Things could have gotten pretty bad for Kay and it was just his fault. He swallowed a thick lump in his throat and stopped to look at Itachi again.

"Is she all right?"

"I don't have time for your stupid questions. Now you are either going to hurry up or I will have to drag you myself out of this room."

Sasuke spat out something that sounded very much like "asshole", but Itachi ignored his anger and waited for him to leave the room before he followed him outside. They both walked out of the organization, in the cold night, soon being engulfed by the forest around the headquarters.

Gaara watched them through the window and smirked, starting slightly when he heard the door close on the other side of the room. He turned around, with a guily smile plastered on his face. Another Gaara stood by the door, staring at him with cold, precautious eyes. The battle between the two pairs of eyes would have scared even a dinosaur, but then the Gaara from the window formed a one-handed seal and a cloud of smoke engulfed him, revealing Kay as soon as it disappeared.

"Hey, Gaara!" she said. "I didn't think you would come back so fast!"

"I was only in the kitchen." he replied. "What's this all about?"

"First, let me know if you are planning to use your sand to torture me, no matter what I have done."

Gaara narrowed his eyes and shrugged silently, glimpsing around to find Sasuke.

"Well..." she started shyly, playing with her fingers "Itachi took Sasuke with him in a mission!" Kay gasped out.

"Because...?" the boy questioned her patiently.

"There would three or more reasons for which this will be good for him. To begin with, after he took part in the sealing of the one-tailed beast ritual, he must have gained the complete mangekyo, and Itachi will be able to teach him how to use his evolved kekkai genkai. Secondly, this could improve their relationship and thirdly, Pein couldn't do anything to him anymore. Did that answer your question? Can I please leave now?"

Gaara stepped aside from the door, as if telling her that she could walk out the door anytime, so she hurried towards the door, but stopped next to him when he spoke in a low voice she had never heard him use before:

"Do you know anyone strong enough to get rid of Pein?"

Kay lowered her head and remained silent, memories of that day coming back to her within moments. Tobi giving orders to everybody, including Pein, who had followed them without comments. Tobi was Madara Uchiha. Tobi was the one who would never take orders from somebody else, despite having been Zetsu's subordinate, despite being an Akatsuki member under Pein's orders. Something didn't add up, but she didn't trust Madara, and neither did Itachi.

"I'm sorry." she said. "The only one who could be stronger than Pein is not trustworthy and until I am not sure of his exact position in this organization, I can't make any moves. However, I will try to find out more."

Gaara wondered who could that person be and after Kay left the room he sat on the couch and thought about it. Starting with Sasuke and himself, he quickly rejected the idea and thought about Itachi. No, he remembered someone mentioned that Itachi was not even half as strong as Pein. Then perhaps Zetsu, but he was too loyal to the damn pervert to even think about doing something against him.

Judging by what she had said, he was a member of the Akatsuki. But except Itachi, Zetsu and perhaps one or two others, none of them could even dream about being as strong as Pein, not to mention stronger. Out of instinct, he expected Shukaku to howl and was slightly confused when all was silent in his head. His heart reacted somehow to that and it was only then that he realized something seemed to be missing. The strange feeling took over him, made him shiver. The voice of Shukaku was gone and he could only hear his thoughts, nothing else.

He went to his bed and fell on it, pulling the covers around his cold body, unable to understand what he was so afraid of. He stared blankly into the darkness, feeling watched by unfriendly eyes. Without the shukaku his abilities were restrained and he felt insecure. He couldn't allow himself to be so weak. He couldn't let Pein find out that he had been really affected by the loss of the shukaku. That annoying man would come after him like a vampire thirsty for blood. Perhaps now that he could sleep, a nap wouldn't be so bad. He really needed one to clear his mind.


	25. Chapter 27

**Chapter 27: Likewise **

"I don't get it." Sasuke spat angrily. "This doesn't make any sense to me!"

"Good." Itachi replied calmly.

For a while, the young Uchiha only followed Itachi, who made his way through the thick forest effortlessly, without asking anymore questions. There had to be a way to get answers from him and it would take days for them to get to Yukigakure, so he had a lot of time. The only problem was that something similar to an interrogation would piss his brother off; therefore, he had to make it seem a normal conversation. Moreover, his brother was not stupid at all...

"Are you seriously in love with Kay?" he listened to himself asking all of the sudden, scolding himself for it.

Itachi ignored him for a while, but replied in a normal voice:

"It's rather just a physical attraction. Are you in love with the jinchuriki?"

"Yes." he replied without hesitation, trying to prove that he was not as heartless as his brother.

"Baka." Itachi snorted. "Pein took advantage of that."

"Well excuse me for not being as wise as you are, Itachi-_sama_" he retorted, making the word 'sama' sound more like 'teme' "but unlike you, some people have feelings! I don't know why I came with you in this stupid mission! I think I will go back right now and you can't do anything to stop me!"

He turned around, ready to jump off the branch he was on to head back to the headquarters, but something stopped him by holding his shirt. He glared back at Itachi, who met his defiant eyes with great calmness, unwilling to let go of his brother's shirt. Sasuke curled his hands into fists and pulled out a kunai, pointing it at Itachi's arm.

"Let me go." he hissed. "You can't use your tsukiyomi because it would be too exhausting and we haven't even left the Land of Rain! There is no other way to stop me than killing me!"

Itachi didn't react to his little brother's childish outburst, but he was not going to prove to him that he was right and using tsukiyomi after just a few minutes had not been a part of his plan.

"Tell me, foolish otouto, haven't you grown up a little after all these years?" he sighed. "It seems to me that you are still the same annoying brat I left alive at the Uchiha mansion years ago. What a disappointment you are."

Sasuke tried to look away from those two eyes, but it was already too late and the world around him became the world of the tsukiyomi, red, white and black as it always was. Itachi stood in front of him, with a kunai in his hand, making Sasuke take one step back instinctively. He was certainly doing it on purpose. Itachi was not so stupid as to deliberately exhaust himself from the beginning. Why did he have to be so stubborn?! Why didn't he just let him leave?

"I can't be that damn precious to you." he mocked.

"Let's find out just how precious you are. We have 72 hours to play around here, but we are going to play by my rules." Itachi smirked. "You might as well give up your childish ideas and come with me to Yukigakure. I will be more than happy to release you from my genjutsu."

Sasuke would have liked to give up his ideas and follow his brother if it hadn't been for his dignity and besides that, there was something that warned him about trusting his brother. Itachi was not the type that would waste so much of his energy to let someone escape without being tortured for several hours at least.

"Yeah, right." he spat. "Like I'd trust you."

"Fine." Itachi said in a deeply uninterested voice. "Be it as you wish."

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"Hey, Tobi." a soft, strangely persuasive voice made him turn around and drop the box of milk he was holding.

"H-hey, Kay." he responded, making himself busy with the milk he had spilled on the floor. "So, what's up? Why aren't you with Itachi?"

She raised an eyebrow.

"I'm not glued to him in case you didn't know. He's just my partner."

"Came to have breakfast?" the other Akatsuki member asked in a faked normal tone. "Guess you'll have to eat cereals without milk since it's all on the floor. Anyway, I haven't seen you in a long time. How are things going?"

"For the time being, everything is well."

"So, you're a good girl. Tobi's a good boy too."

"We need to talk, Madara."

The man jumped in surprise and his head hit the table on the way up, so he stared at her through the only hole in his orange mask while rubbing his head with one hand.

"Tobi thinks you should be more careful about what you say and sorry, but Tobi doesn't have any time for chats. Tobi has to go now."

Kay slammed the door with her foot and locked it, then sat on a chair in front of it, looking at Tobi, who had completely forgotten about the milk.

"I don't think so." she said in the same cold voice. "Tell me what I need to know and I'll let you leave."

Tobi chuckled low and took his mask off, putting it aside, on the table. He crossed his arms and looked at her patiently.

"What is it that you need to know, Kay?"

"It's not the best place. We should go somewhere else. The walls seem to have ears in this organization."

"Very well." he said, taking her hand and making a one-hand seal to teleport them to Tobi's room, leaving the orange mask and the spilled milk behind.

Kay pulled herself away from him as soon as they were in his room, rubbing her hand as if his touch had burned her skin, still glaring at him. Madara chuckled again when the couch met the back of her legs and she fell on it, growling like an angry cat.

"So, are you going to tell me what bothers you?"

"Suppose you were the true leader of the Akatsuki, using Pein only as a cover... how would you supervise him? Would you know everything he did in his spare time?"

"Hmmm... yes. Using a thinking cover up is risky and I since I would be responsible for using him, all the stupid things he did would be my responsibility as well. I would probably give myself fake missions and actually my eyes on him all the time, without anybody else know that I'm still in the organization."

"What if he did something really bad? Would you let him continue?"

"That depends. You can only control a person to a certain extent unless you use a mind-control jutsu. However, if the person we are talking about is Pein, using a mind-control jutsu would be difficult; therefore, I would have to make him obey me somehow. As I said, I could only control him to a certain extent. By interfering directly, I would only threaten his position as a leader in front of everybody else and they would know something is not right. Doing it indirectly could also be risky, because by doing something bad that wouldn't affect the organization Pein can be seen as a tyrannical, but true leader. So it depends on whether it affects the organization or not."

"What if he was gay and he was raping other members?" she asked, slightly amused by the grimace he made at the sound of that.

"Gay? I thought he was bi!"

Kay slapped her forehead and sighed.

"I know. Just answer the fuckin' question, please."

"Okay. I would probably wait for him to stop doing that or I would make him stop."

"Oh, by raping him yourself?"

"No, I'm straight!" he smiled.

"Okay, I have one more question for you. Are you the true leader of the Akatsuki?"

"What if I was?"

She got up and looked at him, knowing that even if all the evidence incriminated him, his eyes were constantly denying the truth. Madara had to be the true leader, using Pein only as a cover.

"Is that why you are trembling?" he asked in a whisper. "You know the truth and you still want to hear it from me. You are a very stubborn little girl, aren't you? I have nothing against your hearing this if you keep your mouth shut after you leave this room."

Madara held out a hand and gripped her wrist, pulling her closer to him with a single tug.

"I am the true leader of the Akatsuki. I am the one who created it. I am the one whose orders you should follow and to who you will report right now. Where is Itachi?"

She hesitated, but his hand threatened to break her wrist so she spoke in an angry tone:

"In a mission to Yukigakure."

"Oh, that's interesting. But if you are here, who left the headquarters with him this morning?"

"Sasuke." she sighed.

"Good girl. You know what? I have an idea. Since you know about me and Pein is not yet aware of that, I want you to act as a counter-spy for me. I could have simply used a mind-control jutsu with you, but something tells me that won't be necessary, will it?"

"What exactly do you want me to do?"

Madara sneered, narrowing his eyes as the grip on her wrist softened a bit. She was in trouble and she knew it all too well.

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Sasuke hadn't said anything all day and he wasn't going to do it very soon either. Itachi couldn't care less about his very pissed off little brother; he was currently busy with keeping the fire burning in the small cave they used for shelter that night. They were both tired and edgy after their little quarrel in the morning and Itachi silently cursed Kay for giving him the idea of dragging Sasuke with him to Yukigakure.

It still hurt to think about what happened in the morning, although Itachi had only tortured him for eight hours instead of 72 – he must have gotten bored – and he hated him now more than ever. The only thing that stopped him from trying to strangle him and get himself killed was the fire that burned between them, remining him that no matter how tired he was after having used the tsukuyomi, Itachi was still able to kill him easily.

He caught a small package in mid-air involuntarily and stared at it, then at Itachi, who still paid no attention to him. Opening it, Sasuke saw some bread and bacon, his dinner for that night, so he started to eat, only muttering a small 'thanks' which he thought Itachi couldn't hear. But something suddenly dawned on him and he couldn't be quiet anymore, snapping all of the sudden:

"What about the Hyugas?"

Itachi stared at him calmly, more surprised by his brother's decision to talk to him than by the question he had just asked. He continued to cut his part of the bacon with a kunai and replied in a cold voice:

"They're still alive if that's what you want to know."

"What's Pein planning to do with them?"

"I don't care."

Sasuke resumed his eating and thought about it better. Deidara had mentioned once that no one had ever escaped from the dungeon alive without becoming an Akatsuki member. He had been in the same situation after having been defeated by Itachi and he probably knew better. It was strange, but he couldn't ignore the fact that he knew Hinata and Neji and it wasn't easy to deal with it.

Memories of the days when he was still in Konoha, memories of his days as a member of Team 7, memories of his friendship with Naruto and Sakura, memories of those annoying fangirls following him everywhere... memories of his past. He scolded himself for blowing the ashes off that old grave in which his past was buried. He didn't want to remember that, because he was now a different person, one that was stronger than the old Sasuke, one that loved and was loved, one that was no longer an avenger. Yes, a completely different person and although he hated to admit it, he was more like his brother now. He finally had a hope that one day he'd be strong enough to defeat him, something the old Sasuke had lost completely as time went by.


	26. Chapter 28

**Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto & Co. and I don't own the quote "A ninja must see underneath the underneath." **

**By the way, thanks for your reviews, everybody! **

**Chapter 28: Break the Ice**

"_Another way to supervise Pein is through spies like you. I want you to find out what he's up to."_

"_Are you suspecting him of something?" _

"_Maybe. Leaving aside his little problem with being a 'good boy' at night, Pein is a very sly ninja. I've given him the power to control some of the most dangerous criminals on earth as long as he respects my rules. However, these rules might be a bit restraining and he's been acting quite strangely lately. As much as I would like to think that he's not planning to get rid of me and take my place, a ninja must see underneath the underneath."_

"_So what should I do?" _

"_Oh, there are lots of things a kunoichi like you can do to... persuade a shinobi to tell them everything, especially a shinobi like Pein, whose weakness for beauty is well known."_

"_You've got to be kidding me!!" she snapped. _

"_I thought you wanted to help your friends. You know what Pein really wants, don't you?" _

"_Besides being the most powerful shinobi ever?"_

"_Actually, it's not a "what" he wants, it's a "who" he wants. He hurt Gaara because he couldn't get to Sasuke, and when he got to him, he hurt Sasuke because he couldn't get to his older brother. Sooner or later he will find a way to have Itachi as well. I should get rid of Pein right now, but I would lose my cover and he is a good leader too. However, if you can bring me proof of his betrayal..."_

"_FINE. I got the point."_

"_Good girl." _

"_Stop calling me like that. You make me sick." _

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"I've never been to Yukigakure before. What kind of shinobis are there?" Sasuke asked when he finally managed to catch up with his brother.

"Cold and deadly." was all he got back in reply.

"You could try to be a bit more specific about that."

Itachi glared at him, and then looked ahead, his watchful sharingan ready to detect any enemy. They were in the Land of Waterfalls (near the border with the Land of Snow) a land mostly hostile towards strangers.

"They don't use close combat usually." he said in a low voice. "Some of them use senbon and their techniques are very accurate. They are a small nation and few of them actually become ninja, but those who do are far stronger than the average ninja in Konoha or Suna. Even the genin in their village are able to kill a chunin from another village. You're going to need your sharingan, so keep it active. They have scouts in the entire land and you could get caught in a senbon storm."

"Wow. I've never heard you talk that much since... almost forever." he sighed, activating his sharingan. "How come they're so strong and their genin never take part in the chunin exams? I mean... I've never seen a snow-nin before."

"They have their own exams every year and they never get involved in matters that don't concern them. That's why they don't like to be bothered."

"So what documents are we supposed to take from them?"

"Secret documents." Itachi replied in the same tone.

Sasuke suddenly remembered about the second part of the Chunin Exam and his first encounter with Orochimaru. He still couldn't understand how Kay had accepted that guy as her sensei for three years. Well, that must have been the reason for her being so crazy and not-very-much-like-a-normal-Akatsuki, but the question was if any of the Akatsuki members was not slightly mentally disturbed.

Pein had a serious problem with being a pervert and a rapist, Konan was arrogant and bossy (Shikamaru would have certainly fallen in love with her...), Itachi was the biggest sadist he had ever known, Kay was definitely not a normal girl, Deidara had a blow-up-everything problem, Zetsu was a weird looking cannibal (ewww...), Tobi was some sort of a 3-year old minded assassin, Sasori would have turned his own girlfriend (if he had had one) into a puppet and ... so on.

"Was Kay in trouble with Pein because of me?"

Itachi gave him a strange look and shook his head.

"She can act a lot better than you. Her initial plan was to play dead, but luckily, she dropped it five minutes before coming to replace you. She only made Pein think you were too drunk for him to play with you."

"Oh, I can imagine her doing that. What a nightmare. Really, what's wrong with this girl?"

"She must have hit her head when she was young." his brother shrugged his shoulders, using a slightly amused tone to which Sasuke responded with a low chuckle.

"That was so mean of you. I thought you were in love with her."

"What did I tell you about that physical attraction two days ago?"

"So you did **it**." he sneered.

Itachi glared at him and refused to react otherwise, but sped up the pace instead, as a punishment for the very tired and big-mouthed curious Sasuke. The younger Uchiha just sighed in annoyance and said nothing else about the only matter that seemed to bother his brother so much. Just when he wanted to ask another question, he saw something with his sharingan and looked at Itachi to see if he had noticed as well.

"I guess this is our 'welcome to Yukigakure'." he whispered, so faintly that no one else except Sasuke could hear him. "Remember what I told you earlier."

One snowflake danced in the air in front of his eyes, followed by a cold breeze and three senbons, which he easily stopped with his kunai. He wondered if the ninja who had thrown those senbons was just playing with them. The wrost part was that he couldn't spot the shinobi with his sharingan.

"Can you see him?" Sasuke asked, in the same low whisper.

"The shinobi is not here, he's pulling the strings from somewhere else. These places are full of traps controled from afar."

"Yeah. They sure hate close combat. Does that mean that it's their weakness?"

"Not necessarily." he replied, taking the kunai hidden in his sleeve. "Watch out."

Another bunch of senbons pointed at them where released from a trap, but they were both ready for them. After that attack, Sasuke felt weird for a moment, as if some weight had been lifted from everywhere around them and he heard Itachi whisper again.

"I think you annoyed them with your comment."

"If you were to chose, which would it be? The traps or the snow-nin behind them?"

"Neither." Itachi replied in a simple voice, as they both stopped and jumped off the branches to land on snow-covered ground and meet the emptiness of their enemy's blue eyes. Sasuke's first thought was that the ninja was thinner than Gaara when he was twelve and he couldn't even imagine that guy fight for the simple fact that he couldn't understand where his muscles were, if he had any. "_By the way..._" Itachi's voice suddenly echoed in his head, reminding him of the form of telepathy the Akatsuki members used sometimes. "_I lied about those documents."_

"_What the fuck do you mean by that? What are we really after?" _Sasuke glared at him.

"_The five-tailed beast._"

"_When were you going to tell me?!"_

"_If it hadn't been for this inconvenience, probably much later." _

"_Wow, thanks a lot."_

"I'll take care of him." he muttered, angry about the fact that he hadn't been told anything about the five-tailed beast being their real objective. Besides, the snow-nin didn't look dangerous, except for that cold indifference glowing in his deep blue eyes.

"_Reckless fool. Remember what I told you." _Itachi scolded him.

"_Yeah yeah..." _

He quickly used his fire based jutsu and attacked the strange ninja, but he was fast as well, using a substitution jutsu just before the balls of fire could hurt him. The clone broke in shards of ice and Sasuke immediately turned around, looking for the enemy. Itachi was also watchful, although he had initially considered the snow-nin an inconvenience. If he stood hidden like that, he represented a threat.

"_Fuck! I lost him!" _Sasuke thought.

"_Don't worry about that, he'll come back." _

The boy felt a strange cold breeze from behind and spun right in time to block some senbon, catching a glimpse of their strange enemy as well. Itachi also blocked an attack and his youger brother realized that he had never seen his brother so **not** uninterested in the enemy. He wanted to ask him whether the tailed-beast had a host, but he didn't have time to do it because senbons gushed out of the trees towards him when he moved and he barely had time to avoid them.

"Fuck!" he spat. "That wasn't him, it was a trap! I thought he had given up those things! If he is fighting us, then who..."

"You idiot. Now the entire forest knows we're here."

Sasuke jumped back on the branches above, trying to figure out who was now behind the traps. He saw Itachi fighting against the white-haired ninja, who proved to be rather equal in speed and chakra control. His first thought was to go help his brother, but he rolled his eyes and murmured:

"Yeah, right, like he'd ever need help from someone like me."

He felt watched and he didn't like the feeling at all. At the same time, a thousand sad things ran through his mind at the same time, making him slightly distracted. It was the cold breeze again that woke him up from his daydream. The two ninja were still fighting in the snow and neither seemed tired at all, which made him shiver at the thought of seeing Itachi defeated by some stupid snow-nin. Incredibly though, the image appeared clearly in his mind: his brother's bloody corpse lying in the crimson snow as some wolves approached cautiously, lured by the smell of blood. For an unknown reason, Itachi's body was replaced by Gaara's and Sasuke kept staring, unable to believe what he was seeing. It actually seemed real: he could smell the blood and the unforgiving cold, he could hear the whines of the hungry wolves and the snow crunching under their paws as they slowly made their way towards the dead body.

He noticed he was holding a kunai in his right hand and he watched his hand raising, poiting the deadly weapon towards his neck, again, for a reason he did not know, but somehow accepted. For the first time after a long, very long time, his mind was empty. Sasuke didn't want anything anymore. He knew he would feel a complete relief when the kunai would slice his throat open and he was eager for it. Then a familiar voice yelled something that sounded like "You fool!", the kunai in his hand was removed by another and the two weapons stopped in the dark-colored branch of a tree. Sasuke looked down, from where Itachi was glaring at him. "Behind you!" another shout came from his brother, this time able to wake him up completely.

His reaction was almost immediate, as if he had known all the time someone or something was behind him. The moment his gaze intersected with those purple eyes, familiar feelings tried to take control over him again, but this time, they stopped without Itachi's intervention and Sasuke had an extra second to look at his enemy. The sharingan noticed the emptiness in her eyes and the darkness of her expression. When the extra second was gone, she held out a hand and simply pushed him off the branch with one finger.


	27. Chapter 29

**I know the five-tailed beast was a wolf named Gobi, but I changed that a little... I only found out about him after writing this chapter and I was too lazy to modify anything...**

**Chapter 29: Gaze into Darkness**

It didn't matter that he was currently falling to his death and if it hadn't been for the strange sensation in his body, he would have never noticed it. Sasuke couldn't break that weird eye contact with the snow kunoichi that had just pushed him off the branch. She was still watching him with her unnatural purple eyes as his mind was constantly being invaded by dark thoughts. He didn't know where all those thoughts were coming from, they were mixed up in something almost incoherent, a bunch of images, sounds and sensations he had never known he experienced, like some memories from when he was two years old.

A kunai pinned him to a tree by the shirt, metres above the ground and Itachi continued his fight with the other shinobi, who managed to keep him busy pretty easily, busy enough to prevent him from helping Sasuke more than that. The sharingan in the boy's eyes faded to ebony-black, but he was still looking at her. The kunoichi seemed to let herself fall backwards from the branch and she leaped gracefully on another branch near Sasuke, pulling out a few senbons as she slowly walked towards him. Sasuke knew he was hypnotized. Something in her eyes... something frightnening... like all the nightmares he thought about at the moment, for a reason he didn't know. Perhaps she was the one doing that to him. Perhaps if he could just look away from her... for one moment...

He saw something shining behind her for a moment and then her pale lips parted a little, a small drop of blood staining the pearl-grey garment she wore, on her left shoulder. The girl discarded the senbons and used her right hand to pull out the kunai that Itachi had thrown to delay her from killing Sasuke. He took advantage of the few seconds he had and pulled the kunai pinning him to the tree out of his shirt to free himself, but whatever spell she had cast upon him was still very effective and he could hardly move to get away form her. The kunoichi simply stared at the bloody kunai in her hand, appearing to have forgotten about Sasuke for the time being, but as she stared at the knife, her other hand moved to form hand signs and an unknown jutsu made the raven-haired boy freeze on the spot, so that he was only able to move his eyes and mouth.

She gazed at Itachi and within a few seconds she jumped off the branch and Sasuke lost sight of her. He activated his sharingan and tried to warn his brother that she was planning to attack him as well, but his voice didn't listen to him and all he could hear was a low growl deep in his throat. The other Uchiha felt her coming and dodged the blow he had foreseen, but it never came and the only ninja who attacked him was the white-haired shinobi. He quickly recomposed himself, trying to outdo the two ninja that had lured them both into such an interesting trap. He braced himself for the shinobi's jutsu, but instead he saw a flash of light and his sharingan only caught a glimpse of the kunoichi that had struck him.

She landed on the other side, holding the kunai between her lips as blood dripped from it, staining the perfect, white snow. Itachi felt something warm aching on his right cheek and blood gushing out of his wound. He saw the shinobi step back as if he didn't want to get involved in the battle anymore and decided to become offensive, get rid of those two and find the five-tailed beast to get over with that stupid mission. He spun and kicked, knowing that she was right behind him, but she vanished into thin air before he could hit her. Itachi cursed under his breath, but tried to remain calm and concentrate. He knew snow-nins were strong; the boy he had fought until then proved that to him, but the girl was abnormally sly and fast, not to mention far too strong and self-controled for a kunoichi of her age. He had a hunch about her and if he was right then the mission was going to end sooner than he had originally anticipated.

Itachi fixed his sharingan on her, looking for any unusual physical traits... like the strange make-up pattern on her eyelids, similar to the one on a leopard's fur, only that the colors were black, purple and silver. The five-tailed snow leopard. He hadn't noticed until then because of the white bangs covering her forehead, but he knew he couldn't be mistaking about her. She was the host of the beast, which also made everything else clear, like the fact that she was so strong and fast. He realized that Sasuke was captive in her jutsu and that he couldn't risk attacking her yet because of him. She could have easily killed him. The fact that the battle itself was so quiet irritated him the most. He wanted to hear someone scream, whether it was Sasuke, the jinchuuriki or the other snow-nin who did it. He was craving for it.

A soft frozen whisper prickled the skin on his neck and he immediately directed a kunai towards the source, although he only hit a tree. The game was starting to become annoying. He rejected his anger and frustration, trying to concentrate instead, trying to feel her moves as his own to be able to stop her. He had learned this technique some time ago, from Kay. He deactivated his sharingan and waited for the jinchuriki to strike with his eyes closed, breathing deeply, although the cold air made his lungs hurt a little. Itachi knew he could feel the blood running in her veins like his own. Her chakra was like an invisible shield around her small, rather undeveloped frame. He sensed it dark and raging like a blizzard, but silent at the same time.

When he opened his eyes he only saw himself in her eyes, nothing else. As much as he wanted to avoid that empty gaze, Itachi found himself lost in it. However, unlike his younger brother, he wasn't going to fall for it that easy. As soon as the pain shot through his left arm he regained control of himself and for a moment he could see a light shadow of dissatisfaction on her pale face. Now that he had gotten her on the ground, he wasn't going to let her go away again and play with him. The worst part of the game was that she was dangerous either if she was close or far. Luckily, she didn't run away: she pulled out senbons from her sleeve and prepaired to attack. Itachi ignored the pain that had completely taken over his left arm because of the kunai with which he had been forced to stab it to break free from her eye-jutsu.

He quickly made her throw the senbons and miss thanks to his vigilent sharingan and she had no other weapons, but the kunoichi seemed to have other plans. Her right hand was encased in ice and it formed something very similar to a sword, something Gaara would have done using sand. Itachi frowned at the sight of yet another inconvenience, but remained calm. If only his little brother hadn't been so foolish to think he'd be able to do everything all by himself. He used several kunais to slow her down but she attacked in full force and would have hurt him if he hadn't used a substitution jutsu. Itachi reappeared behind her, aiming for a weak spot in her right shoulder, but missing as she gracefully leaped away from him in the snow, with the moves of the feline she had inside.

Her second attack with the ice sword was not as strong as the first one, but more confusing, because he couldn't predict any of her moves at all. She was purposely doing it to make him insecure and she was doing a pretty good job even though he would've never showed it. He took a step to the right and she missed again, but this time he managed to hit her and she flied back into a tree, falling on her hands and knees into the snow to spit blood. Itachi hadn't expected her to recover so fast after the heavy blow he had used on her and what he felt half a moment after he saw her running towards him was something warm, cold and wet at the same time, somewhere in his abdomen, most likely right under his ribcage.

She pulled the sword back immediately and it broke, cutting her own hand at well. She was slightly panting, but the look in her eyes was nothing more than before, perhaps just a sparkle of arousal. Itachi knew he couldn't mold chakra for much longer, but he still had some left for the mangekyo. If he could only look into her eyes without falling prey to her mysterious jutsu. Because there was no other way, he decided to take a chance and he made some effort to pin her against a tree in a few seconds, an action to which, suprisingly, she didn't react with more then a stiffening of her body. The shinobi Itachi hadn't forgotten about moved and that was when the kunoichi did what the Uchiha thought as the most stupid thing she could do. She pulled out another kunai from her sleeve and threw it towards her partner as a warning. However, he was still not sure about it and made another step, but this time she glared at him and it was a glare of both anger and agony that was enough to convince him.

The snow-nin disappeared and she turned her head to Itachi again, making the second big mistake: she looked into his crimson eyes.

Sasuke suddenly felt the cold grip on his body disappear and he fell on his knees, hungry for air and cold, at the same time worried for his older brother, although it was not like him to worry for that scum. He jumped down from the tree only to see his eyes locked on hers, no murmur escaping her parted lips, even if she was in the mangekyo world, tortured to something very close to death by Itachi. She only gasped once, hissing through gritted teeth as her expression became one of pure anger. There was surely something she wasn't very happy about.

He then noticed the huge stain on his brother's ripped cloak and wondered whether that small girl had managed to hurt Itachi Uchiha, the one he had never been able to even touch when it came for a fight. And where had the other snow-nin gone? He could see him nowhere, neither alive nor dead. It seemed an eternity until the kunoichi's body became limp against the tree, but still held in place by Itachi's right hand. Her eyes, which still haunted Sasuke's mind along with all the terrible things she had shown him, finally closed and she relaxed completely, appearing to have fallen asleep. Itachi lay her down and sat next to her, trying to catch his breath because of the pain burning in his abdomen. He saw Sasuke and simply glared at him for falling into her trap, but he was too pissed off and tired to say anything to him yet. Besides the wound and the cold, the 72-hour time spent in the world of the tsukuyomi had been a horrible experience for him as well.

He knew he needed to rest and take care of his wounds because he was losing blood, and he really wanted to get some sleep and eat something by the fire, with the damn jinchuriki safely tied in the corner of a small cave that would serve them as a shelter, but Sasuke seemed too busy staring to help him get up or carry the girl. Deciding that yelling at him wouldn't be a good idea for his aching body, he lay in the snow as well, hoping that the icy cover would soothe the pain somehow and freeze his mind so that it wouldn't hurt everytime he thought about the long way back to the Akatsuki base...


	28. Chapter 30

**Chapter 30: The Howling**

Gaara knocked at the door of the Leader's office and waited for the permission to enter, which was a muffled response he could barely even hear. By the dim light and the mess inside, it looked as if a hurricane had passed by. There were all kinds of documents spread on the floor and over the desk and Pein seemed so small hidden behind the pile of papers that the boy didn't even notice him at first.

"Good evening, Sir."

"Have a seat, please." he replied in a weak voice, having no intention to remove his left hand from his forehead, which indicated a possible splitting headache. "You'll have to wait for a few moments until I find that paper... I'm pretty sure it was somewhere around here a few moments ago..."

The red-haired ninja waited patiently in his chair while the leader messed the papers even more. He muttered something close to "where is that woman when I need her" and pulled out a paper soaked in wine. He stared at it for a few seconds, until his face turned green and he mumbled an 'excuse me' before rushing out of the room. Gaara didn't know how it was to get drunk and be really seedy afterwards, but he had seen it once or twice at Kankuro before. He wondered how many glasses of white wine Pein had had the night before.

When the leader returned into the office, he was awfully pale and looked like he just needed a long vacation. He covered his eyes and held his nose with two fingers, speaking in a very funny voice:

"Could you please take that paper for me and look over it after you leave the office?"

"Of course, Sir." Gaara replied politely, taking the document.

Pein sat in his chair and needed to squeeze his eyes shut to be able to concentrate again.

"Okay." he said. "All the information you need is on that paper I gave you – actually, what's left of it, sorry for that. You don't have to go very far, I don't want to stress you too much after... well, the ritual. I know Sasuke is not here, don't even try to lie to me, but you can take that nuisance with you."

"Excuse me?"

"I meant Kay."

"_Nuisance?_" Gaara wondered, instinctively waiting for shukaku to express his opinion as well, but slightly disappointed in the deep silence that had replaced the beast's growls.

"You may leave. Oh, and if you see Konan, please tell her to come here and bring some Tylenol with her..."

"Yes, sir."

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"Need some help with that?" Sasuke asked, looking furtively at Itachi's wound while taking care of the fire.

"No." the other ninja replied, obviously pissed off.

"Don't be so grumpy. At least we're not in Yukigakure anymore. They won't come after you, will they?" he asked the girl, who sat in a dark corner of the shelter, blindfolded and tied up tightly. She didn't even move a muscle in reply, although both Itachi and Sasuke knew she was awake. The tsukuyomi hadn't been enough to keep her unconscious for more than six hours. "Do you think she's mute or something?"

"How do you suppose she could perform any jutsus if she were mute? She's just ignoring you." Itachi answered, removing his fishnet to clean the deep gash in his abdomen.

"And everybody else." Sasuke continued in a low voice. "She even ignored her partner. I'm not very sure... she might as well be deaf, you know."

Sharp icicles shot towards Sasuke and stopped a few inches from his face, making him crawl backwards in surprise.

"Well, you have your answer now." Itachi sighed.

That move of hers reminded Sasuke of Gaara in the chunin tournament. He could recall every moment of that battle as if had happened the day before and not years ago.

"What do we know about her?"

Itachi looked at the girl in an odd way, then at Sasuke and continued to clean the blood on his skin.

"She can knock you out easily if the knots you made aren't strong enough."

"Besides that and the don't-look-in-her-eyes thing." the boy muttered. "Hey, uhm..." he said, not really knowing how to call her. "What's your name, kunoichi?"

He could feel her glare even through the blindfold and since she didn't look like she was going to give in, Sasuke redirected his attention towards his older brother. It was easy to tell that Itachi's wound was not to be neglected, although he didn't flinch at all and it must have hurt a lot. He could only notice a small frown on his expressionless face, but nothing more than that. Sasuke suddenly felt invaded by a strange affection towards his aniki, a feeling he didn't think was proper after hating him for so long, but also one he couldn't deny. He sighed, wishing his heart told him to do otherwise. Itachi watched him approach, wondering what he could possibly want, and was taken aback to see his little brother take the cloth from his hand to pour water on it and wash the blood.

"So you really don't know anything about this jinchuriki." the boy stated in a whisper even Itachi could barely hear.

"I might know a few things. You didn't believe Pein sent me after the five-tailed beast without giving me any clue about where to find it and what's it like, did you?"

"Why you..." Sasuke growled. "And why didn't you tell me? It wasn't such a big secret after all."

"Yeah, perhaps I should have warned you."

The younger ninja raised a brow inquiringly. He glimpsed at the girl sitting in complete silence on the cave floor, wondering if all the snow-nins were as silent as her and the other shinobi. For a moment, he even considered asking his brother, but it was no use bothering him with such childish questions.

"Tell me..." he murmured while playing with the bandages he had taken out of his backpack. "Did you torture her like you torture me every time you use the tsukuyomi?"

"Even better. You don't deserve the effort to be tortured."

"Bastard." Sasuke muttered. "How come she didn't scream at all? Fuck, I could barely see her react somehow!"

"Why don't you try it yourself if you want to see how she reacts to torture?"

The boy glimpsed at the girl again and looked at his older brother in disbelief.

"Is this a challenge?" he asked, curving his lips into a devious smirk.

"I don't know. I don't think you're prepared for one."

Sasuke growled angrily and finished taking care of his brother's wound, then stood up and walked calmly towards the immobilized kunoichi, eager to prove to his brother that he was wrong about him this time. He knew he had gained the complete mangekyo after the shukaku's sealing ritual, but he hadn't had the chance to test it until then. He knelt in front of her to be at her level and activated his mangekyo, using his left hand to remove her blindfold. For a moment they looked each other in the eyes and then the scenery changed into the very familiar crimson world of the tsukuyomi.

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"There's the outpost. A few miles away from here." she stated, looking ahead with her sharingan burning vividly in her eyes. "I think we should threaten to wipe them off the face of the earth and see what they give us as a bribe. We'll wipe them anyway, of course." she sneered.

"You can wipe them off. I don't want to use Sabaku Sousou today."

"That's fine with me. Let's get that scroll and get the hell out of here. Iwagakure gives me the shivers."

Gaara followed her through the forest, telling himself that he would have surely used Sabaku Sousou if he was still the host of Shukaku. Without the beast, things were more or less different. He almost felt pathetically weak without the ichibi's automatic defense and because of that he had to be ten times more careful about enemy attacks. It wasn't easy for him to get used to his new life without the constant whispering of Shukaku in his head, without his power and lust for blood, without the passion with which he crushed his victims. Most of all, he couldn't get used to sleeping like a normal human being. The fear of being consumed by the beast's power if he were to fall asleep was still haunting him and every time he managed to fall asleep he had nightmares that kept him awake for hours. Consequently, he was tired and moody all the time.

It wasn't much longer until they reached the outpost and Kay revealed her diplomatic talents by threatening everybody to blow them up, although terrorism was Deidara's job most of the time. Kay also had a passion for blowing things or herself up. Gaara didn't even listen to the conversation between her and the guards of the outpost, however when everybody was silent and the fight began, he was the first to kill, crushing a nearby guard with his Sabaku Kyuu. Kay's stamina proved to be remarcable, as she ran like a butterfly from flower to flower, killing whoever was in her way with a katana. It was obvious that Gaara and her were not fit to work together, but the mission was simple, almost too simple for the Akatsuki. He could have gone by himself, but Pein had insisted to take Kay with him and now she was ransacking the entire place like a hurricane.

Some of those people preferred to stay away from her and concentrate on him instead, since he only stood in one place. Gaara saw them coming and immediately knew they were an easy target. Another one sneaked behind him, but the ninja manipulated the sand to crush him against a rock, while making the others choke with it. When all the attention was focused on Kay again, he used Sabaku Kyuu to catch a man and interrogate him about the scroll they had to retrieve for Pein.

"I don't know where it is!" the man yelled, squirming in the tight grip of the sand. "Our leader-sama took it somewhere else a while ago because he feared of an attack like this one! I don't know where he took it! Now take everything you want and just leave!"

Gaara tilted his head to one side, considering the man's words, but found himself displeased with the answer and tightnened the grip even more, making the soldier scream in pain as the sand slowly crushed his bones.

"I swear I don't know where it is!" he whined, his eyes popped out in terror and agony, but Gaara didn't care. Something in that man's voice wasn't very convincing. Something in his eyes told him he knew more than that. A lot more. "But... I'll bring the scroll to you if you let me go and stop the attack!"

The sand moved over the victim's body and Gaara narrowed his eyes in disgust.

"Apparently, there's no need for such a brave act of betrayal." he muttered as the sand brought the scroll taken from the man's hidden pocket in his hand. The other hand turned into a fist and the sand crushed the unfortunate liar into blood and a few fragments of bones. He caught glimpses of the horrified looks of the other soldiers and almost felt their hate and contempt burning his skin. How much he hated people who looked at him that way, even though he could no longer be considered a monster since the one-tailed beast was not in his body anymore...

His chakra twisted violently, almost painfully, making him feel weird, slightly dizzy... as if he were drunk. The image of him as a child suddenly invaded his mind, the memories of loneliness and despair... what didn't bleed like a wound, but hurt even worse...

He closed his eyes, wondering what was happening to him, and felt an urge to hear screams and taste blood. He instinctively covered his ears, in attempt to stop the deep, imaginary howls of Shukaku, because it was gone and he must have been imagining those sounds. Tears stung his eyes as he tried to stop his own mind from making those horrible noises, but everything was in vain. He needed to feel alive again. The last days he had felt so numb and far from the real world that now he couldn't deny himself the pleasure of killing so many annoying little people.

He raised his arms in the air and glared over the "battlefield", sand gushing out of his gourd to rise over the entire place like a threatening tsunami. The devilish grin plastered on his face widened as he heard people screaming in horror, trying to run away. But all their efforts were petty in front of his desire to kill. Gaara could feel the power running through his veins again. It was overwhelmingly good to be some kind of god again, to take other people's lives at his will, to be able to choose between a slow death or a quick one, depending on his mood.

"Sabaku Sousou." he hissed, all the screams stopping at once.

Gaara remained still for a few moments, all of the sudden realizing what he had done. The sand slithered back into his gourd as he stared over the bloody field in disbelief. He caught his breath quickly and tried to make those howls audible again, although he could only hear his desperate, fugitive thoughts running randomly through his mind. A familiar voice made him jump slightly and he turned around to glare at Kay, who tried to get some sand out of her tousled hair.

"I don't want to use Sabaku Sousou today!" she immitated him in a funny, but obviously displeased voice. "You ruined all my fun and now I have to wash my hair as well, not to mention that you almost killed me! What do you have to say about this?"

Gaara glared at her, but felt a shadow of regret at the thought that he could have indeed killed her. He had completely forgotten about her. Instead of excuses, he only growled at her and walked away. She followed him and asked him what had happened, but Gaara didn't even look at her when he replied in a dark voice:

"Be quiet or be dead."


	29. Chapter 31

**Chapter 31: Happy Birthday**

Sasuke heard a small chuckle and stared at the girl in front of him, wondering whether it had been only his imagination or she had just let out a sound. Her pink little lips were curved in something slightly similar to a smile, but again, he could have imagined it. He had 72 hours to play with her and he made a promise to himself that he would make her speak using any means necessary.

"I wouldn't like to have to torture you for you to open your mouth and speak." he said, looking in her empty eyes. Unfortunately, he couldn't blindfold her there. "But I might if I lose my patience with you."

"_Oh, wouldn't that be a catastrophe?" _he heard his own thought questioning ironically, although he had no idea what had made him think those words.

"I guess we should start with your name. Don't pretend you didn't hear me." Sasuke continued threateningly, playing with a kunai.

"_That sounds lame. I've never used the tsukuyomi before. I've never tortured anyone for pleasure, like my older brother. I'll never be like him." _

"Very well." he muttered, pointing the kunai at her arm.

"_We'd better hurry up back to the headquarters before Pein does something to Gaara again." _

The weapon left a deep, red line behind it, starting from the shoulder and ending at the wrist, bypassing one or two veins. The blood didn't hesitate one moment, but she seemed immune to pain.

"_I could never stand torture like this. The last time Itachi tortured me I screamed like a little baby." _

Sasuke flinched, the last thought annoying him pretty badly. He used a quick move and stabbed her palm, which made her close her eyes and squeeze them for less than enough to satisfy him. Trying to make it more painful, he moved the kunai in her wound, looking in her eyes all the time, trying to catch at least a glimpse of suffering.

"_It's no use; she won't tell me her name. I'm not doing a very good job with this. I bet Itachi did better when he tortured her. I'll never be as good as him." _

Sasuke pulled out the kunai and took her hand, looking at it closely, then moving his gaze upon her face again.

"Can you even feel pain?" he asked her, leaning in closer to her face. "How old are you?"

"_Can't you see it's useless? My brother must have given up faster, but I just don't know when to admit defeat, do I? Give up and head back for the headquarters. I don't like the idea of leaving Gaara alone there, with Pein around." _

The boy sighed in irritation, but tried to remain calm. Losing his temper with such a child would be a mistake and a demonstration of weakness. She certainly looked younger than fourteen and older than ten or eleven, so she was still a kid.

"_What if she's sixteen?_"

Sasuke frowned at the stupid question in his head and moved her hand to make it hurt. Those stupid thoughts kept popping in his head like that and he had the unpleasant sensation that something was in his head, giving him the shivers. Perhaps that was how Gaara had felt with the beast inside him. He thought about the idea for a moment and suddenly glared at the girl.

"_I'm looking at her as if I wanted to rape her or something._"

He let go of her hand and deepened the glare.

"Children like you shouldn't even know the meaning of the word 'rape'." he said in a cold voice.

The same odd sound that resembled a chuckle so much echoed in the space around them. Her eyes opened completely, staring at him in a way hard to define: evilness and superiority were the first words that came in his mind. She certainly liked that superiority the five-tailed beast gave to her. Sasuke tried to figure out how did his brother manage to make her let out even one scream when he couldn't make her do more than squeeze her eyes shut for a second, but the answer to his question was nowhere to be found. Besides that, she was playing with his mind.

"Stop it. I know what you're trying to do."

_"Good boy."_

It seemed to be the only way he could talk to her. Through his mind. Although it was somewhat painful and uncomfortable to feel her stream of thoughts trespassing in his mind, there was no other option.

_"Fuck you, Kakashi. Didn't you say there were always other options?! Were are those fuckin' options now?" _

The girl's lips parted slightly and her look changed a little, from mischievous to... almost hurt. Sasuke glared at her, wondering if his swearing had offended her, but before he could even realize what was wrong, a sharp pain shot through his head, making him lose his balance and almost fall. The jinchuriki's expression was threatening and when he looked into her eyes again, the same horrible pain caused by thousands of dark thoughts and images sent into his mind made him lose control of the doujutsu. He breathed in sharply and fell on his back on the hard cave floor, as Itachi quickly blindfolded the girl again.

"What the hell?!" the younger boy hissed.

Itachi let out a small chuckle and sat back in his place, next to the fire burning vividly away from the cold rain outside. Sasuke caught his breath and knelt in front of his brother, trying to figure out what had just happened. His older brother tossed a stick in the fire after playing with it for a while, waiting for Sasuke to speak his mind. He knew his doujutsu had been broken.

"Had a rough time with her?" he asked ironically, a bit taken aback to see his little brother nod calmly.

"I don't get it." the boy said, glimpsing at the silent lump in the darkest corner of the small cave. "How did she...? The mangekyo... I thought..."

"Thought what, foolish little brother? That it was invincible? Not in your sweetest dreams, or at least not until you learn to use it properly. She's not as weak as she seems, after all, she is a jinchuriki. Considering that she also uses people's minds to 'share' her thoughts and your mind is no place where I'd like to waste my time in, I guess it was expectable for you to fail."

"What's that supposed to mean?!"

Itachi sighed.

"Foolish little brother... and to think that I was proud of you for a moment..."

Sasuke rolled his eyes in irritation.

"Fine. Got the point." he growled.

--

He could hear the earth-shaking voice growling deeply, obviously displeased with something, but he had no idea what it was. He tried to ask and no sound escaped his lips, not even the faintest, as Shukaku's voice continued to fill his head. Gaara couldn't understand why it wasn't working. Something felt wrong, in spite of the welcoming sensation of physical relief, but perhaps that was exactly what made the bijuu so unhappy.

**"Wake up, shrimp."** Shukaku's voice howled, followed by a thundering laughter that made Gaara jolt in his bed and wake up with a scream of terror, the terror that he had fallen asleep and Shukaku had taken control. Only to realize that the bijuu was no longer inside him.

He kicked the blanket covering him away with his feet and threw the damp shirt clinging to his torso on the floor, breathing heavily and shaking. The clock on the bedside table proved to him that it was no use trying to sleep like a normal person: he had only been asleep for one hour. Gaara's breath became normal and he sighed, thinking that he was probably going to die because of exhaustion. He couldn't sleep because Shukaku was still haunting him, the fear that he would lose control for good if he were to fall asleep even for one minute turning into a nightmare every time he tried to become normal. Maybe he was not meant to be normal.

Suddenly, he realized that he was being watched and turned his head to meet the crimson sharingan that had been analysing his every move unnoticed. Normally, he would have felt a seed of happiness turning into flower somewhere in his heart at least, but considering his nightmare and the fact that he hadn't even felt his partner's chakra in the room, so close to him, made him angry. Sand slithered along the floor and pinned the Uchiha down as Gaara rose from his bed and knelt beside him, looking in those burning eyes. Sasuke didn't do anything against his partner's deadly weapon and neither did he say anything. They watched each other for a few moments in complete silence, until Sasuke decided to speak.

"You can let me go now. As you can see, I wasn't trying to kill you."

"How long have you been here?" a dark question came from his partner instead.

"Half an hour."

The sand slowly went back into the red head's gourd, as if still not sure about Sasuke's intentions, but Gaara wasn't going to just let him go. He moved, so that he was now on top of his partner, with his hands on both sides of the Uchiha's head and one knee between his legs to make sure he wouldn't try anything stupid. Sasuke didn't mind. He could see the tiredness in the sand dweller's eyes, caused by the lack of sleep. His nights must have been nightmares, both when he was asleep and awake.

He knew how unstable Gaara was before, and could imagine the extent of that instability now. The Gaara he knew had changed, even if just a little bit. The only thing he could do was try to regain his trust and stay by his side... perhaps more than before. Sasuke used slow moves, ready to stop at any sign of uncertainty his partner might show. His arm rose gracefully under the sand-nin's eyes, his slender fingers brushing against the soft skin of his cheek in a gentle caress. Even so, he could feel Gaara stiffen at the contact and relax forcefully a few moments later.

"It's okay, I won't bite." Sasuke whispered, trying to pull him closer. "I promise."

But Gaara didn't seem so understanding, so he made the first move, careful to be just as gentle. The red head soon gave in to the kiss, having to admit that he had missed it a lot and Sasuke managed to make him lower his body over his, deepening their kiss. It felt strange after such a long time, almost unfamiliar to both of them and especially to Gaara, but the warm feeling growing in their bodies was like a welcome back.

"Happy birthday." the raven-haired boy whispered when they partned for air, his lips still brushing against his lover's.

Gaara released him with a sigh and sat on the bed, looking at him with the same tired eyes. Sasuke smirked confidently as he sat up from the floor and pushed the other on the bed, able to convince the red head to let him take control. The sand-nin recognized the spicy scent of snow in Sasuke's soft hair, startled by the fingers he had entangled in it as the boy kissed the pale skin on his neck. But there was also something else.

"What kind of mission was this?" he asked, a soft moan escaping his lips along with the other words when Sasuke's tongue danced a little tango on his collarbone.

"Fucked up." the reply came hastily, since he was currently busy.

"You don't look hurt, but your hands smell like blood."

"I was only wounded in my pride." Sasuke said, going back to capture Gaara's lips under his own. "Itachi was the one who had a little trouble, though."

The leaf-nin stopped for a few moments, rising to look into those bewildering aquamarine eyes until a white, slender hand rose in the darkness and pulled him back down gently, something Gaara had never done before. When he wanted it, he got it in a matter of seconds and he never wasted time being gentle. Sasuke would have liked to tease him a bit more, but Gaara's patience had a limit and it was better not to cross it.

"You look tired as hell. Maybe you should get some sleep."

"Do I look like I wouldn't sleep if I could?" the red head asked with a small sigh.

"Maybe if you stay in my arms you'll be able to get some sleep."

"What makes you think that?"

"Unless you want me to fuck you until you fall asleep unwillingly from after-sex exhaustion." he added with a seductive smirk.

"Hm, maybe tomorrow night. I'll try something less tiring tonight." Gaara replied, pushing Sasuke next to him to rest his head on his chest as the other wrapped his arms around him. "I promise." he muttered before the leaf-nin could even voice his thoughts. He smiled and rested one hand in his partner's red hair and the other on his waist, watching him for the rest of the night to make sure he didn't have anymore nightmares.

--

Itachi leaned on the door for a moment before turning around to lock it (you never knew when Tobi had an insomnia from eating too much sugar at once). Despite the late hour, Kay wasn't in her bed, but he knew she was some sort of a 'human owl', spending most of her nights awake, looking at the stars, wandering on the hallways like a ghost or training outside. He released a tired sigh and dropped his cloak on the floor, not bothering to put it somewhere else because his muscles were sore and he didn't want to make more moves than neccesary to get to the bed. However before he could throw himself into the bed for a good, long sleep, the bathroom door opened and Kay stared at him through tears, her cheeks flushed and wet. She let out a frustrated sob and ran towards him (by the looks on her face probably to slap him or something), but she tripped over Itachi's discarded cloak and had to cling to him so that she wouldn't fall. The ninja looked at her as she regained her balance and buried her face in his shirt, refusing to let go even if he could have broken both her wrists by the way his hands had gripped them. He hoped she would not stay like that for long, or at least say something, but that didn't happen and he decided to take action in order to go to sleep as soon as possible.

"Cut that out, woman." he hissed. "You're an S-class ninja, for kami's sake!"

"Who gives a f-fuck on kami's sake?!" she sobbed, sounding almost as if she made great efforts to speak.

"Tell me what the hell is wrong so I can get some sleep."

She looked at him with red, puffy eyes and finally released his shirt from the deadly grip she had on it.

"Nothing's wrong!" she faked a smile, but it faded into an expression of contempt as she spoke. "Everything's never been better! Fuck you. You're just an insensitive weasel. Why would you care? Go get your sleep. You sure look like you need it."

Itachi snatched her wrist and pulled her in front of him with one move. How easy would have been to break those bones in her wrist one by one with only one finger. After all, he was a master of torture and that was, perhaps, because he loved torturing people and never did it just because he had to. He loved to see pain and would have loved even more to see her kneel on the floor in front of him, a simple wish easy to accomplish, considering that she showed no resistance either. But he was tired, she was a masochist and the effort of making her suffer would have been almost inane. He could see it in her eyes: she wanted it.


	30. Chapter 32

**Author's note: thanks everybody for reviewing, I know it took me a long time to post this chapter and it will probably take me just as long to post the next one and I'm already sorry for that, please accept my humble apologies (this word is probably spelled wrong ...). Demonluvr: I didn't have time to send you a copy, but if you notice any mistakes please feel free to send me a PM and I will find ****some time to edit the chapter and correct them. Also, this story is coming to an end very soon and there will be no more missions for our beloved Akatsuki members since they are currently in some trouble and won't be able to get out of it. Thank you for your offer though, I really appreciate your help. Wow, this is a long note for an authour who hates author notes. On with the story now...**

**Chapter 32: A Villain's Diary**

Itachi raised a brow as Kay closed the door and stared back at him strangely, keeping the distance. The door behind her led to Tobi's room.

"He's got flu. I brought him some chicken soup." she shrugged in response to his inquiring gaze.

The Uchiha prodigy narrowed his eyes as he watched her heading for the stairs. She had been acting quite strange lately, from waking up before him and train until noon to being nice to Tobi. Something was going on... something very interesting.

--

Madara chuckled behind his orange mask and locked the door before taking it off. The greedy look in his eyes had a hint of insanity as he rubbed his hands together, sitting on the couch. He was looking at a book on the table, one with black leather covers and strange metal studs rather looking like piercings. He wondered what those were for, but they were probably there just for the design. More important was the content of the book, which, in fact, was not a book, but a diary.

"Poor Pein... so easily tricked by a kunoichi." he sighed mockingly, taking the diary in his hands. "Let's see what you have been hiding from me, my dear friend." he smiled, but the bright smile faded almost immediately. "I should have expected that. What kind of jutsu is this?"

"My mistake, I forgot to tell you." Kay's voice filled the room. Madara saw her sitting casually on the window-sill, adjutsing one of her fingerless gloves. She held out a hand and the ninja gave her the diary, watching her transform into Pein and bite her index to draw some blood. The girl drew a strange symbol on the front cover using a copy of Pein's blood and then whispered a word. "That should do the trick." she said.

"Thanks." Madara replied, opening the diary to reveal Pein's elegant handwriting. "How did you get your hands on this?"

"The important thing is that I got it. I don't have to tell you how that happened."

"I wasn't asking that as your superior. I was just curious." the ninja defended himself.

She looked at him for a few moments before deciding to give a damn answer to his damn question.

"I got him drunk and he told me everything. Is that enough?"

Madara sneered.

"Of course it is, dear. Thank you for your efforts. I will be forever in your debt."

"No shit." she mocked, jumping on the window-sill to leave. "By the way, I told Itachi you had flu, so you'd better put that talent of yours to act to good use. See ya."

The man diverted his gaze from her to look back at the precious thing he held in his hands. If there was no evidence of Pein's betrayal in his diary, then there was no evidence at all and Pein was not a traitor.

"Come back later, will you?" he said just when Kay was getting ready to jump into the tree in front of the window. She shot him a dirty glare, but said nothing, only nodded before disappearing.

_December 25 - Today Zetsu made cookies for everybody. It's unbelievable how a canibal like him can cook so well... if it's not a salad. If you ask Zetsu to make salad he's going to eat you instead. Unbelievably, Konan is a total disaster in the kitchen. The deadliest thing she can do is mistake sugar for salt, or worse, salt for sugar. Nonetheless..._

"Nothing interesting here." Madara mumbled, turning some pages. "Only that Pein can keep on writing about the same thing for hours..."

_December 29 - Finally, I've managed to discover the location of the five-tailed beast and a team left the headquarters this morning. I though it was Itachi and Kay, but I saw Kay wondering on the halls around lunch so I asked her about her partner and she told me he had gone with Sasuke! Unbelievable. That kid's going to be lucky if he gets back here alive. Come to think of it, Itachi has been showing signs of shympathy lately. I'm actually worried about him. I bet it's that girl's fault - the red head. Itachi's heart should belong to me, not her!! Anyway, besides the fact that soon I will have that beast sealed into the statue, Madara hasn't given me orders since that unfortunate event after the sealing of the ichibi. It's strange, considering the fact that I've been receiving orders from him ever since I became the fake leader of this organization. It doesn't matter really. It is so much better without him continually watching my every move with those eagle eyes. It won't be much longer... when all the beasts shall be sealed into that statue their power shall be mine and mine only... and I will rule the world, of course! _

_January 5 - I wonder what's taking the Uchihas so long. Hm, it's true that it's a long way to the Land of Snow... but Itachi's never makes his missions last for more than a week! Normally, I would worry because I would have to send another team after the beast and it would take a lot of time, but it's Itachi I'm talking about here, he's one of the best members in this organization! I'm sure nothing happened. With or without that little brother of his, I'm sure he'll come back very soon. I only need to be patient and act as if nothing happened and I'm not looking forward to capturing all nine beasts so much. Madara's not stupid. At the beginning, I thought he'd be easy to manipulate, but every time I tried, he proved me I was wrong about him. _

_January 19 - They're FINALLY BACK!! Itachi didn't look so well and the jinchuriki seems dangerous - in fact, the report said "do not take the blindfold off" - and yes, the kid is still alive... I can't wait for the ritual: TOMORROW!! I'd better get ready. Oh, and before I forget, I had the strangest dream last night... I dreamed Kay and I kissed and she asked me if I had a diary... I can't remember if I gave her an answer... WEIRD!_

"When all the beasts shall be sealed into that statue their power shall be yours and yours only... and you will rule the world... of course **not**, Pein." Madara sneered, closing the diary. "Kay did a great job... I knew a kunoichi like her could get me what I needed."

--

They were both sleeping. Normally, Neji would have been aware of his presence, even if he had concealed his chakra carefully, but the jonin was asleep too. Sasuke knew the organization didn't need them. Pein had probably even forgotten about the Hyuugas. He himself had forgotten about them for a long time. He did nothing but watch them, waiting until one of them got up. He felt like he had to apologize before setting them free. That thought had been roaming his mind for a while, and now that he had seen them, he was determined to do it. What had impressed him the most about the two was their position. To protect her from the cold and unfriendly floor, Neji had allowed Hinata to sleep on his body and she held his hands in hers, trying to keep them warm.

Unable to look away from them, Sasuke didn't even realize when he leaned on the bars of the cell in which the jinchuriki from the Land of Snow was, and neither did he hear her crawl towards him. He jumped in surprise when he felt something cold slithering on his neck and his heart skipped more than one beat. Soft hands covered his eyes, but he was too frozen in panic to shout or move.

"Take my blindfold off."

Her voice was merely a whisper and he could only hear it because her lips were very close to his ear. He tried to speak and the only sound that left his throat was a small whine, followed by some barely audible and stiff words.

"Why don't you take it off yourself since you managed to untie the ropes?"

"I want you to do it."

"You're not going to trick me. If I untie that blindfold you'll look into my eyes."

"If you don't move, I won't move either. I just want to see them."

Sasuke's chest was rising and falling so fast he couldn't even think clearly. For some stupid reason, he almost felt like he could trust her.

"And if I do this... will you let me tie you up again? If someone sees you..."

"Maybe I will." she cut him off.

To his surprise, his hands moved, his fingers, almost against his will, untied the knot easily and the black cloth covering her eyes fell on the floor, revealing the Hyuugas to her deep gaze. The leaf-nin didn't move anymore. His hands remained entagled in her hair as she looked at Hinata and Neji over Sasuke's shoulder.

"What a nostalgic sight." she whispered in his ear.

"So.. you can talk after all." he sighed, remembering that she hadn't said a word before. "Why didn't you tell me your name? You're going to die, you know that. It's no use..."

"Be quiet." she replied softly. "If I uttered **your** name now you'd be dead in less than one minute, therefore, I have no intention to utter anyone's name, especially mine."

Sasuke forgot to breath again. What kind of jutsu did she use to kill people merely by speaking their names? His thoughts were dispersed again, this time by footsteps coming closer, descending on the stairs. He heard the girl chuckle behind him, moving her hand only a little to catch a kunai thrown towards her.

"You idiot."

The boy shuddered at the sound of his older brother's voice. Itachi stepped forward into the light, glaring at him mercilessly.

"Let him go. He's so stupid he doesn't deserve the effort of being killed." the man continued, looking straight into the girl's eyes, fearlessly.

Sasuke felt her hands slither away form his eyes, only to fall on the hard steel bars of her cell, gripping them casually. Unlike when they had fought against her, the jinchuuriki's moves were lazy and slow, not breaking the eye contact with Itachi for one moment. As soon as he had the chance to, the young Uchiha made a big step away from the bars, spinning on his heels to face her. The girl however, was not interested in him.

"Why did you go near her, foolish otouto?" Itachi asked, a small frown visible on his usually stoic face.

"I thought she was still unconscious after her last encounter with your perfect mangekyo, aniki." he replied mockingly, knowing that even if his brother couldn't give him a death glare right now, he would gladly beat the shit out of him later.

"Well, you thought wrong."

Sasuke shrugged and decided to go get some help, but the jinchuuriki proved that she hadn't forgotten about him completely.

"Don't move. I will be out of here in a second and you will get all the help you need."

As she said that, the bars in her hands froze completely and she stepped back with a smirk, using a strong kick to break them. Itachi moved and pushed Sasuke towards the stairs, ready to hold off the host of the five-tailed beast. Pein shouldn't have waited so long for Deidara and Sasori to come back from their mission to start the ritual. Their plan was about to fall apart now.


End file.
